

V. '07. 13 



' ' no evidence at present to show whether this character 

 "is or is not common to all the species of the genus. 

 ' The specimen is a male, but none of the testes are 

 " quite mature. All the zooids in the whorls I examined 

 " bear gonads." S. J. HICKSON. 



FAMILY MURICEIDAE. 

 Clematissa robusta (Wright and Studer). 



S.B. 151. 50 mi. W.N.W. of Eagle Island, Lat., N., 54 

 17'; Long., W., 11 33'; 388 fms. ; bottom tempera- 

 ture, 9*15 C. ; 27th August, 1904. 



' There is only a fragment of this Muriceid, and I have 



some hesitation in referring it to the same species as 

 " the Challenger specimen from the Sarmiento Channel, 

 ' Patagonia. There can be no doubt that the three 

 "genera Clematissa, Muriceides, and Paramuricea are 

 " closely allied, and that our knowledge of them is still 

 " very unsatisfactory. 



" In their method of ramification, in the distribution 

 " of the zooids, in the character of the coenenchym and 

 " axis, and particularly in haying swollen terminal ex- 

 " tremities to the branches, they are very much alike, 

 " but they differ in the character of the spicules of the 

 " coenenchym. 



' ' In Clematissa the spicules are spindle-shaped or club- 

 " shaped, with many branching tubercles, and but rarely 



become foliate or flattened to form irregular spiny plates 

 11 (Stachelplatten). 



' ' In the character of the spicules our specimen ap- 

 " proaches the description of the spicules of Clematissa 

 " more closely than that of the other two genera. On 



comparing it with specimens in the collection of the 

 ' British Museum I found that in the thickness of stem 

 " and branches, in the arrangement of the zooids, in the 

 " colour of the axis and coenenchym, and in other 

 " characters it approaches Clematissa robusta more closely 

 " than any other species of the three genera. The genus 

 " Clematissa was founded by the authors of the Chal- 

 " lenger volume on the Alcyonaria for three speci- 

 " t mens found in depths of 245-360 fathoms in 

 " the South Atlantic Ocean, but a new species, 

 " C. sceptrum, has recently been described by Studer 

 ' t ' t (1901) from Lat. 38 N./and depth, 1,135 metres, off 

 '' the Azores. The genus is therefore not confined in its 

 " distribution to the S. Atlantic waters. The Irish speci- 

 ''men is 100 mm. long, and has three branches. The 

 " axis is 2'5 mm. in diameter at a distance of 50 mm. 

 " from the end. The axis, with its investing coenen- 

 ^' chym, is at the same region 3 mm. in diameter. The 

 " swollen terminal knobs of the branches are about 5 mm. 



