MOPSELLAD^;. O 



/3. Coral dark red, with yellow cells ; cells small, in two rows, almost 

 entirely confined to the sides of the branchlets ; in some specimens 

 the cells are not so distinctly marked and bright- coloured as in 

 others. 



The interarticular pieces of the branches vary in surface : in some 

 specimens they are nearly smooth, in other specimens they are deeply 

 and irregularly longitudinally channelled. 



Lamarck describes three varieties : 



a. Purple, ramuli very numerous. 



b. Whitish yellow, ramuli less numerous. 



c. Yellow, with series of purple cells on the sides of the branchlets. 



71, Melithaea virgata. 



Coral expanded ; principal branches nearly parallel, much elongated 

 tapering, and subdividing far less rapidly than in M. ochracea ; the 

 calcareous segments of the axis elongate. 



Melithaea ochracea (part.), Dana, from Fejee Islands. 

 Melitodes virgata, Verrill, Butt. Mm. Comp. Zacd* p. 38., 



Hob. Feejee Islands. 



Fam. 7. MOPSELLAD^E. 



Coral branched, on a plane ; branches from the articulations, 

 forked, often parallel and anastomosing. Axis calcareous, solid, 

 hard, semitransparent, pink, longitudinally striated. The inter- 

 nodes swollen, spongy or cork-like, red. Bark moderately thick, 

 granular, spiculose. Polype-cells somewhat prominent, in one or 

 more series on the edges of the branches. 



Synopsis, of Genera. 



I. Coral fan-shaped. 



1. MELITELLA. Polype- cells long, in several rows. 



2. ACABARIA. Polype-cells broad, short, in one row. 



3. AJSTCELLA. Polype-cells small, prominent, in one row. 



II. Coral shrub-like, forked. 



4. MOPSELLA. Coral shrub-like, dichotomous. 



5. CLATHRARIA. Coral shrub-like, dichotomous, inosculating. 



I. Coral fan-shaped. 

 29. MELITELLA. 



Coral fan-like, expanded, .forked ; branchlets generally inoscu- 

 lating, often divaricated. Cells rather convex, numerous, in several 

 series on the sides and upper surface of the branches and branchlets, 

 leaving a slender impressed line -destitute of cells on one (the lower) 



