160 



THE OCEAN WORLD. 



We shall describe three genera, the two first of which belong to the 

 MADREPORE A, and the last of the family of the Porides. 



DendropTiyllia ramea, represented in Figs. 75 and 76, is an elegant 

 madrepore of the Mediterranean. Its polyp presents a very large 

 trunk charged with short ascending branches; it usually attains to 

 about a yard and a half in height. The polyps are provided with a 



Fig. 74. Uendroph} Ilia ramea, half natural size (De Blainville). 



great number of tentacula, in the centre of which the mouth is placed. 

 They are deeply buried in the cells, which radiate from numerous 

 unequally saillant plates. Peyssonnel, who had seen the polyps of 

 this colony, says : "I may observe that the extremities or summits 

 of the branching madrepore, the species in question, which in the Pro- 

 vencal we call Sea-fennel, is soft and tender, filled with a glutinous and 

 transparent mucous thread, similar to that which the snail leaves on its 



