194 Dr. J. E.Gray on the Growth of Hyalonema. 



carried away by the dredge or by the nets, or otherwise ; and 

 on entire specimens, as well as on fragmentary ones, there will 

 often be found the parasitic Palythoa investing them, and in 

 some cases, where the head has been torn off, even creeping- 

 over the tip of the upper end of the stem and overgrowing it, 

 as in the specimen you sent me. 



" You see I venture to' prophesy ; and although it is said 

 that l no one is a prophet in his own country,' I may perhaps 

 turn out to be one in the depths of the Japan sea. And when 

 you have placed before you the superb specimens so procured, 

 and the old ones too, you will have the history of the Hyalo- 

 nema, as follows : — 



" a, being the old notion. 



" 5, your supposition. 



" c, my interpretation. 



" d, what I expect from the dredge. 



" e, disjecta membra. 



" z, Hyalonema boreale } the innocent cause of this contro- 

 versy." 



As a note to the observation just quoted, Dr. Carpenter 

 observes, as if he considered it a contradiction, that " Dr. J. E. 

 Gray, whilst still maintaining that the flint-rope is a zoophytic 

 product, and that the sponge with which it is connected is 

 parasitic, has also come to the conclusion that the brush-like 

 termination serves as the root implanted in mud, above which 

 the sponge is borne." 



It appears to me that the fact of Flint- Sponges and the 

 zoophytic Hyalonema both having spicules sunk in the sand 

 and serving as roots, may be an analogy as well as an affinity, 

 considering that they both have to serve the same purpose of 

 supporting the animal on a soft and yielding base, and that if 

 the spicules were formed of calcareous matter they might be 



