120 AUTUMNS IN ARGYLESHIRE 



one complete at the other extremity. In sea 

 water the fleshy appendages expand as little 

 flower-like polyps, united to the stalk by a semi- 

 transparent medium, each capable of a separate 

 existence, and to be seen under the microscope 

 feeding healthily " with the pinnules grasping an 

 animalcule and gently conveying it to the mouth." 

 It is this curious mutilated condition of the ordi- 

 nary virgularia the -problems it suggests, still 

 unsolved in my opinion and the hope of attain- 

 ing the pinnacle of a collector's ambition, which 

 makes it so interesting. Small and insignificant 

 as it may be, the first discoverer of an absolutely 

 perfect specimen ought to feel 



" Like some watcher of the skies 

 When some new planet swims into his ken." 



What, then, are the reasons given by writers 

 upon this curious zoophyte to account for the fact 

 that while perfect specimens are supposed to ter- 

 minate in a feather at one end and a bulb at the 

 other, like its first-cousin, the sea-pen (Pennatula 

 phosphorea), it has never been found with both, 

 and seldom with either ? To put it shortly, their 

 theory is, that it stands up with its bulb planted 

 in the mud, and that fish invariably bite off the 

 feathered end, while the brittle nature of the 

 stem, and a power it apparently possesses of draw- 

 ing itself back when touched or pulled, accounts 

 for the root being almost always broken by the 



