Dr M'Bain's Notes on Actinia mesembryanthemum. 283 



tentacula, each extending: an inch. Their number auGjments 

 with age, and hence at the latest period of observation tliey 

 had amounted to about a hundred in twenty years. The 

 whole are unequally divided among the three rows, the inner 

 row being composed of fewest, but they are the largest. At 

 the external root of the tentacula of the outer row, there is a 

 number of apparently solid tubercles ; each, however, is 

 pierced by an orifice, which opens and dilates occasionally, 

 sometime after the animal has fed." 



On the variation of colour he remarks: "The colour of this 

 species might mislead the most experienced observer, nor 

 shall I speak too positively on the subject. It appears to 

 me, that, taking the widest latitude, it may possibly range, 

 through the medium of varieties, from liver-brown to fine 

 and vivid vermilion, that the former belongs to the ordinary 

 and more common portion of the tribe, that the specimens so 

 distinguished have purple tubercles, the base surrounded by 

 a purple ring, and that a purple line or patch from the disc 

 penetrates each of the opposite sides of the mouth. On the 

 other hand, those characterised by vermilion colour have 

 pure white tubercles resembling a row of pearls, and are 

 without any other distinctive marks. In the first, or more 

 common variety, the skin of the adult is liver-brown ; but in 

 the earlier stages, the colour is lighter, and the surface of the 

 animal is sprinkled with fine, oval, green specks in longi- 

 tudinal rows, which remain conspicuous for three or four 

 years at least. They are best seen after exuviation ; for when 

 the animal has cast his skin the new surface is clearer, 

 whereas they become altogether obliterated with age. The 

 under surface of the base is always green. 



Duration of life in this species, — ''This actinia must be 

 deemed a long-lived animal. Naturalists, indeed, as if desirous 

 of proportioning the existence of most animals to the tran- 

 science of their own observations, are too prone to abridge 

 that to which a longer period is allotted among the humbler 

 orders. The specimen still surviving, cannot be much 

 under thirty years old. Another, which must have been of 

 equal size with it when taken, has lived thirteen or fourteen 

 years in my possession. Therefore, both being yet in great 



