124 PAPERS FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF MARINE BIOLOGY. 



tions are sometimes present there is no break between it and M. costata. The 

 development of the septal teeth on the lower margins of the principal septa appears 

 to be correlated with the width of the valleys. Klunzinger's Mussa distans is a 

 synonym of M. cytherea. 



Mussa cactus Dana (type No. 44, U. S. Nat. Mus.) (synonym of M. corymbosa 

 Forskal), Mussa cerebriformis Dana (type No. II, U. S. Nat. Mus.), and Mussa 

 multilobata Dana (type No. 41, U. S. Nat. Mus.) are different species, and as they 

 are not represented in the collections from Murray Island and Cocos-Keeling 

 Islands, they need be only mentioned in this paper. 



Distribution. — Red Sea; Murray Island; Amboina; southern Philippines; Fiji 

 Islands; Tahiti. 



Genus SYMPHYLLIA Milne Edwards and Haime. 



1848. Sympliytlia Milne Edwards and Haime, Acad. Sci., Comptes rend., vol. 27, p. 491. 



Type species : Meandrina sinuosa Quoy and Gaimard = Mussa nohilis Dana = 

 Syniphyllia nobilis (Dana). 



The genus Symphyllia is poorly represented in the collections of the U. S. 

 National Museum. There are of Dana's specimens, which he placed in the 

 genus Mussa, S. crispa (Lam.), No. 86 (subsequently referred to S. radians M. Edw. 

 and H. by Verrill); S. recta (Dana), type, No. 9; and S. nobilis (Dana), No. 7. Dana 

 proposed the name nobilis for Meandrina sinuosa Quoy and Gaimard, 1833, as one of 

 Lamarck's species (1816) had been referred to Mussa. Dana says (p. 188): "The 

 name sinuosa, being elsewhere in use [in the genus Mussa] has above been changed." 

 There is another reason for discarding the sinuosa of Quoy and Gaimard, for their 

 name was based on a misidentification of Le Sueur's Meandrina sinuosa from the 

 West Indies. The specimen identified by Dana from Wake Island is, as he has 

 stated, worn, and it is not the type of the species. It seems to me that the latter 

 specimen is probably the same as S. indica M. Edw. and H. The specimen 

 identified by Dana as Mussa crispa is in excellent condition. It is a young colony 

 of S. indica, as identified by Bedot. There are six good specimens of S. indica 

 in the National Museum, collected in the southern Philippines by J. B. Steere. 

 Dana's type of S. recta is badly worn. It is very close to S'. indica and, should the 

 two names apply to the same species, Dana's recta would prevail over indica. 



Symphyllia nobilis (Dana) is represented by three specimens from the southern 

 Philippines, collected by J. B. Steere, and two fragments collected by Dr. Mayer at 

 Murray Island. These are considered in more detail in the succeeding description. 



Professor Verrill has referred Symphyllia to the synonymy of Mussa.^ From 

 the specimens of Mussa and Symphyllia which I have seen, I would adhere to the 

 usage of Milne Edwards and Haime, and am therefore treating them as distinct 



genera. 



Symphyllia nobilis (Dana). 



Plate 17, figure 35, of Dr. Mayer's article. 



1833. Meandrina sinuosa Quoy and Gaimard, Zooph., Voy. de I'Jstrolabe, Zool., vol. 4, p. 227, plate 18, 



figs. 4, 5 (non Le Sueur, 1820). 

 1846. Mussa nobilis Dana, U. S. Expl. E.\ped., Zooph., p. 187. 



1857. Symphyllia sinuosa Milne Edwards and Haime, Hist. nat. Corall., vol. 2, p. 370. 

 1899. Symphyllia sinuosa Gardiner, Proc. Zool. Soc. London for 1899, p. 73S, plate 48, fig I. 

 1904. Symphyllia sinuosa Gardiner, Fauna and Geogr. Maldive and Laccadive Arch., vol. x, p. 760, plate 59, 



figs. I, 2, 3. 

 1907. Symphyllia sinuosa Bedot, Madreporaires d'Amboine, p. 1S9, plate 21, figs. 99-105; plate 22, 



figs. 106-110 



'Trans. Conn. Acad. Sci., vol. 11, p. 115, 1902. 



