136 Mr. H. J. Carter on the 



anastomosing, transparent fibre of different shades of pale 

 amber-colour, with no obvious core. Fibre of two kinds, viz. 

 vertical or large and horizontal or small fibre, the former 

 terminating on the surface subpenicillately. Structure vertical 

 or radiating. Texture varying from compact, fine, and woolly 

 to rigid, open, and coarse. Forms incrusting or massive lobed, 

 or hollow tubular or funnel-shaped, branched or foliated. 



Group 2. Paraspongiosa. 



Sarcode the same. Skeleton the same, but with the large 

 fibre terminating on the surface in penicilli cored with minute 

 foreign objects. Structure the same. Texture variable also. 

 Forms incrusting or massive lobed, or hollow vasiform, or 

 massive flattened simply or lobed and branched. 



Family 2. Hircinida. 

 Group 3. Hirciniosa. 



Sarcode brown or pink on the surface, pale internally. 

 Skeleton composed of a reticulation of horny, anastomosing 

 translucent fibre of a pale grey or amber-colour, cored more 

 or less with minute foreign objects. Fibre of two kinds — 

 viz. vertical or large, and horizontal or small fibre ; the former 

 terminating on the surface in more or less prominent aculea- 

 tions, between which the horizontal fibre is stretched in straight 

 lines, so as to present a polygonal appearance. Dermal sarcode 

 enveloping minute foreign objects which, for the most part, 

 following the course of the dermal reticulation cover the 

 "polygonal" interspaces with a white lace-like layer*. 

 General structure vertical or radiating. Texture more or less 

 coarse and open. Forms massive lobed, or hollow vasiform, 

 or flattened, or branched"]". 



* Where there is a core of foreign objects, it is most prevalent in the 

 vertical or large fibre and least so in the horizontal or small fibre, which, 

 on this account, is for the most part solid and simple — that is, coreless. 



t N.B. In this family the sarcode is ofteu replaced by a filamentous 

 alga, which so much resembles it in form and position that Lieberkiihn 

 based his family of " Filifera " upon its presence (Archivf. Anat. u. Phys. 

 1859, pi. x. fig. 2). See also good figures of the specimens so affected, 

 under the name of " Polytherses " (Duch. de Fonbressin et Michelotti, 

 " Spongiaires de la Mer Caraibe," Natuurk. Verh. Holland. Maat. Wet. te 

 Harlem, vol. xxi. 1864). 



For this alga I have proposed the name of " Spongiophar/a communis," 

 on account of having found it in different sponges from all quarters 

 of the world, although chiefly in Hircinia ('Annals,' 1871, viii. p. 330). 

 It is often almost impossible to say to which group of the Hircinida the 

 species affected by this alga belongs, especially when the alga has entirely 

 replaced the sarcode, and has thus concealed the skeleton. 



