198 MisceUaneou& 



On Fascicularia radicans, C. Vig., a new Type of Anthozoan. 

 By M. Charles Viguiek. 



When dredging in the mud of the harbour of Algiers, about the 

 middle of last April, we collected this little Alcyonarian, which 

 lived for two months in the aquaria of the new Zoological Station. 

 I made a detailed investigation of this new type, but it is unfor- 

 tunatelj" incomplete in several points. 



The only specimen collected was a female colony attached to a 

 fragment of charcoal, which it covered with a network of slightly 

 flattened anastomosing stolons, from 3 to G millim. broad. Upon 

 these stolons, at very variable intervals, and sometimes nearly 

 touching each other, rose groups of polyps, which, when in the 

 extreme state of contraction, considerably resembled those of Paral- 

 cyonium. But as soon as the colony begins to expand, it is seen 

 that we have to do with a very different type. 



Thus while in Paralcyonium the basal portion is surmounted, in 

 the state of complete expansion, by another common portion of still 

 larger dimensions, or, in one word, the polypary divides into two 

 portions — one soft and retractile, the other hard, within which the 

 former folds itself up, — in Fascicularia there is no other commou 

 portion than the base itself, and far from the polyps being fixed one 

 upon the other, or, more correctly, incompletely separated, they are 

 here entirely distinct to the level of the apex of the basal column, 

 and at this point their separation is very clearly marked by white 

 lines, produced by spicules occupying the top of the interpolypary 

 partitions. The rest of these partitions does not contain any 

 spicules ; but the common wall which surrounds the bundle of 

 polyps is sustained by a palisade of long white vertical spicules 

 which give it its characteristic rigidity. If we make a section 

 perpendicular to the axis of this basal column, we see that the 

 cavity of each of the polyps is perfectly distinct from that of its 

 neighbours, and that even the young polyps are separated very 

 early from that upon which they have budded forth. Moreover, 

 each of the polyps retracts itself separately into its proper cell, 

 or, more correctly, into its basal portion, and enjoys a perfect 

 independence with respect to its neighbours. It is only when the 

 retraction of all the polyps is complete that the column itself 

 begins to retract as much as is permitted by the spicules with 

 which its wall is furnished. 



The free portion of the polyps in the state of extreme expansion 

 may attain double the height of the basal column, which gives, for 

 the whole, a maximum height of 16-18 millim, The number 

 of polyps does not appear to exceed 10-12 per bundle. These 

 polyps have the tentacles relatively very long, and of a bright 

 greenish yellow on the buccal surface. On the outer surface, on 

 the contrary, these tentacles, as well as the whole of the oesophagean 



