238 Dr. Hooker on some results of Deep-sea Dredging. 
unacquainted with any other plant, except the Gloriosa, which 
exhibits the innermost layers of the compound starch forms with 
such remarkable distinctness. 
XXVIII.—Note on some Marine Animals, brought up by Deep-sea 
Dredging, during the Antarctic Voyage of Captain Sir Jamus 
C. Ross, R.N. 
To Richard Taylor, Esq. 
My pear Sir, West Park, Kew, Aug. 31, 1845. 
Havine remarked, in the notice given of Mr. Goodsir’s valuable 
labours in the last number of the ‘ Annals of Nat. Hist.,’ that 
300 fathoms is supposed to be the extreme depth from which 
living animals have been dredged, I think it may interest some 
of your readers to know that Sir James Ross, during the late 
Antarctic Voyage, used the dredge on several occasions with 
considerable success in the same and in much deeper water. 
In latitude 33° 82! S. and long. 167° 40! E., living specimens 
of Hornera frondosa, besides four other Corals, a Dictrupia, two 
Ophiure, an Annelide, one small Kehinus (and the spines of an- 
other, three inches in length), were all procured in a living state 
from 400 fathoms. 
Off Victoria Land, between the parallels of 71° and 78° of south 
latitude, the dredge was repeatedly employed; once with great 
success at 380 fathoms. Generally the contents of the net, after 
dredging at between 200 and 400 fathoms in these latitudes, 
were various Crustacea, as numerous Nymphia, Pycnogona of a 
very large size, and such Arctic genera as Crangon, Alpheus, 
Gammarus and Idotea, the species sometimes resembling very 
closely indeed those that Capt. Ross had met with during the 
North Polar voyages: of Mollusca, the genus Chiton, Boltenia, 
and the remains of both univalve and bivalve shells, of which we 
found no traces on the lands we visited; various Annelides and 
Serpule, Ophiure and Asteria, Alectos, Bicellaria, an Encrinite 
resembling the Irish one, very many Virgularie and Sponges, 
with Holothurie several inches in length. The pebbles were ge- 
nerally covered with Flustre ; but on one occasion a magnificent 
mass of syenite was procured, the edges of which were sharp 
and the surface clean; it must have been but recently deposited 
by an iceberg, for the greater proportion of the stones around 
were of trap or basalt of various kinds. 
The most remarkable circumstance connected with this subject 
of deep-sea dredging is, that the bottom of the Antarctic Ocean, 
near the lands visited by Sir James Ross, was found to be covered 
with a mud consisting in great part of the remains of Infusoria, 
i i i i i i 
