CRINOIDEA. 



LILY-SHAPED ANIMALS. 



Character of the Family. 



animal with a round, oval, or angular column, composed of numerous 

 articulating joints, supporting at its summit a series of plates or joints forming 

 a cup-like body containing the viscera, from whose upper rhn proceed five 

 articulated arms, dividing into tentaculated fingers, more or less numerous^ 

 surrounding the aperture of the mouth, situated in the centre of a plated 

 integument, which extends over the abdominal cavity r and is capable of 

 being contracted into a conic or proboscal shape. ' 



Some species of these animals ascertained to be permanently attached to- 

 extraneous bodies, whilst others appear to have been capable of locomotion. 



Derivation of the Name of the Family*. 



I have derived the name of this family from the Greek TA znA KPINOEIAEA 

 the lily-shaped animals, and have used this word, to form with another distin- 

 guishing term prefixed, the name of the genera. 



Progress of the Study of the Animals now arranged in this Family. 



The columns and columnar joints of the Crinoidea,by their frequent occur- 

 renceand remarkable figure, have attracted the attention of naturalists at an early 

 age. The round columns, and their depressed single perforated joints, marked 

 upon their upper and lower surfaces with radiating stria;, have acquired names 



