ASTILEACEA. BUNODIDjE. 



THE RINGED DEEPLET. 

 Bolocera eques. 



(Sp. nov.) 

 Plate IX. Fig. 6. 



Specific Character. Tentacles wholly retractile ; white, encircled with a 

 red ring. 



GENERAL DESCRIPTION. 



FOBM. 



Base. Adherent, scarcely exceeding the column. 



Column. Cylindrical ; very changeable in shape ; very distensible ; 

 Burface covered with numerous slightly indented, close-set, longitudinal 

 striae ; studded, on the upper two-thirds, with numerous minute warts, 

 increasing in number to the margin : these are either prominent or level, 

 at the pleasure of the animal, and they have the power of attaching frag- 

 ments of extraneous matter, which, however, seems rarely exercised. 

 Substance lax and pulpy, with thin integuments. Margin forming a 

 thick parapet, the summit obtusely edged, and notched with close-set 

 denticulations, which are not warts, but are the terminations of the stria?. 



Disk. Flat, smooth, with very delicate and inconspicuous radii ; outline 

 expansile beyond the column. 



Tentacles. Sub-marginal, set in six rows: 6, 6, 12, 24, 48, 48 = 144 ; 

 short, thick, conical, but versatile in form, in contraction being slender, in 

 distension often ovate, or when this is partial, ovate with a slender point 

 (mucro) ; constricted at foot, and in contraction marked with longitudinal 

 sulci, both of which are very readily obliterated ; the tip perforate. They 

 are subequal, about an inch and a half in length, and when distended, 

 , upwards of one-third of an inch in diameter; are flexuous, and thrown in 

 various directions ; are strongly adhesive ; they are perfectly and readily 

 retractile, but in a peculiar mode ; the margin contracts, till its edges meet 

 over the tentacles, but it never involves itself. 



Mouth. Occasionally protruded in form of a wide cone. Two gonidial 

 grooves, each with its pair of tubercles, and its broad, though faintly 

 marked, radius. Lips thickened. Stomach- wall capable of being pro- 

 truded in great bladder-like lobes. 



Coloub. 



Column. A rich light orange-scarlet, rather duller towards the base ; 

 the stria? marked by slightly paler lines ; the warts white, each inclosed in 



