THE SCARLET AND GOLD STAR-CORAL. 345 



summer at Ilfracombe, and the chills and storms of autumn 

 were already warning the migrant inhabitants away. It 

 was a spring-tide in September, and the water had receded 

 lower than I had seen it since I had been at the place. I 

 was searching among the extremely rugged rocks that run 

 out from the Tunnels, forming walls and pinnacles of dan- 

 gerous abruptness, with deep, almost inaccessible cavities 

 between. Into one of these, at the very verge of the water, 

 I managed to scramble down ; and found round a corner 

 a sort of oblong basin, about ten feet long, in which the 

 water remained, a tide-pool of three feet depth in the 

 middle. The whole concavity of the interior was so 

 smooth that I could find no resting-place for my foot in 

 order to examine it; though the sides, all covered with 

 the pink lichen-like Coralline, and bristling with Laminarige 

 and Zoophytes, looked so tempting that I walked round 

 and round, reluctant to leave it. At length I fairly stripped, 

 though it was blowing very cold, and jumped in. I had 

 examined a good many things, of which the only novelty 

 was the pretty narrow fronds of Flustra chartacea in some 

 abundance, and was just about to come out, when my eye 

 rested on what I at once saw to be a Madrepore, but of an 

 unusual colour, a most refulgent orange. It was detached 

 by means of the hammer, as were several more, which were 

 associated with it. Not suspecting, however, that it was 

 anything more than a variation in colour of that very vari- 

 able species, Caryophyllia Smithiz, I left a good many 

 remaining, for which I was afterwards sorry, since they 

 proved to belong to this new and interesting form before 

 us. All were affixed to the perpendicular side of the pool, 

 above the permanent water-mark : and there were some of 

 the common Caryophyllice associated with them. 



I afterwards found the same species in considerable 

 number, especially during the very low springs of the 



