200 PAPERS FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF MARINE BIOLOGY. 



The septa occur in the complete formula, but present an indefinite appearance, as they 

 are very crooked. There are trabecuke producing septal granules below the upper edge of 

 the wall, while curving, flattish processes join the septal trabeculaeto both the wall and palar 

 trabeculie and also to the septal trabeculae of other septa. The flattening of the processes is 

 not in any one plane; in some places it is horizontal, in others vertical, and in others at varying 

 angles. Although the result is a more or less flaky texture, it is very different from that 

 found in P. nigrescens, where there are horizontal or subhorizontal, flattish, wedge-shaped 

 processes, arranged vertically one above another along the septal plane. Because of the 

 development of the septal trabeculje, especially where the calices are large and there are two 

 septal outside the palar trabeculae, the processes from the septal and the mural trabeculae 

 form a perforate mural reticulum. 



Pali small, irregular knots on the inner ends of the septa. The formula is complete, but 

 with a pronounced tendency toward trident formation in the triplet. The palar trabeculae 

 are joined by more or less flattened and twisted processes into a ring and similar processes 

 join them to the columella. 



A striking peculiarity of the mural, septal, and palar faces and the processes from them 

 is the fewness of small granulations or frostings, producing smoothish skeletal surfaces. 



The columella is a twisted lamella, usually showing attachment to the directive member 

 of the triplet. 



Type: No. 673, U. S. Nat Mus. 



Locality. — Fiji Islands (U. S. Expl. Exped.). 



Distribution. — This species is the same as Bernard's Porites Fiji Islands {24)4, 

 which is Gardiner's Porites trimurata, from Wakaya Reef lagoon, Fiji Islands, and 

 is probably the same as Gardiner's Porites trimurata from Funafuti lagoon.' 

 Bernard says regarding the latter specimens:^ 



"Mr. Gardiner has called attention to the close similarity between P. Fiji Islands 4. 

 and this coral by uniting them under one specific name: 'triynurata.' . . . The calices of 

 the two forms are built on the same essential plan, but are larger in the Fiji form, and the 

 rings of pali are not so conspicuous." 



It therefore seems safe to give the distribution of this species at least as Fiji 

 Islands and Funafuti. 



1 1 . Porites viridis Gardiner. 



Plate 89, figures I, la, li, specimen from Murray Island. 



1898. Porites viridis Gardiner, Proc. Zool. Soc. London for 1898, p. 268, plate 24, figs. li, 2 



1905. Porites fidjiensis nonadecima Bernard, Cat. Porites Indo-Pacific, p. 57, plate 4, figs. 2, 3,4; plate 13, fig. II. 



The following are Bernard's introductory remarks on the specimens from the 

 Fiji Islands and his general description: 



"Under this heading I have grouped five specimens whose affinities have already been 

 pointed out by Mr. Gardiner. They diff"er from one another in most striking ways, yet close 

 analysis shows them all to be variations of one special type of modification. 



"General Description. — ^The corallum may either be incrusting, with thin edges, but 

 with the surface raised into solid rounded ridges, separated by deep, sharp, irregular valleys, 

 or as solid hemispherical mounds with a marked tendency for the upper surface to be broken 

 up into rounded hummocks, separated by narrow fissures or infoldings. 



"The calices are conspicuous and funnel-shaped, with sharp wall-ridges which make 

 them polygonal; when the ridges are absent the calices are round, mostly just under 2 mm. in 

 diameter. The walls are a stout flaky reticulum which varies greatly in texture, and upon 

 these variations depend the extraordinary differences of habit seen in the specimens, no two 

 being alike. The wall-ridge is only slightly developed upon the convex surfaces, but in the 

 valleys it form.s the whole wall. Below the ridge the septa begin at once to appear as flakes 

 sloping downwards into the fossa; deeper down they lengthen, and, according to their thick- 

 ness and the depth of the calicle, form various more or less incomplete septal patterns. 



"The polyps in life are a very bright dark green." 



'Proc. Zool. Soc. London for 1898, p. 270, plate 24, figs. \e, 4, 1898. '0/>, cit., p. 68. 



