1862.] DR. J. E. GRAY ON THE CLAVIFORM SEA-PENS. 33 
a short thick base to the club of about half an inch long. In most 
of the specimens of this form, the polypes are retracted ; but in one, 
some of them are expanded. 
In the second group the club is much larger, varying from 3 to 
7 or 8 inches long, and is attenuated upwards. The base of the 
elub is short and thick, as in the former group of specimens. The 
polypes are generally expanded; they are much more slender and 
more elongate than the polypes of Lituaria australis. 
Probably the Jength and tapering form of these specimens may be 
dependent on their haying been placed originally in weaker spirits. 
The size of the cavities or tubes in the specimens also differ ; they 
are largest in the short broad specimens, but very distinct in all. 
I am therefore inclined to believe that there are only two distinct 
genera of the Claviform Sea-Pens. 
LITUARIA. 
The pen elongate, the upper part slender, tapering, with close 
longitudinal rows of polypes; the interspace between the polypes 
covered with close longitudinal rows of distinct circular pores; the 
opening of the polype-cells, when contracted, longitudinal ; the lower 
part elongate, subcylindrical, smooth ; the axis hard, stony, distinct, 
well developed, quadrangular. 
The lower part of the coral, which is destitute of polypes, is elon- 
gate, often one-third and rarely nearly half as long as the upper 
polype-bearing portion of the club; but the length of the stem, as 
compared with the club, appears to differ, within certain limits, in 
the different specimens of the same species from the same locality, 
but they are always larger and more slender than the same part in 
the genus Veretillum. 
The specimens of this genus in the British Museum appear to 
separate themselves into two very distinct groups, which may repre- 
sent so many species, or may only depend on the manner in which 
the specimens have been preserved, or even on the strength of the 
spirit into which they were at first immersed. 
In four specimens from Penang, collected by Dr. Cantor, which 
are slender and white, all the polypes are entirely contracted, leaving 
a compressed slit over the cell, except in one of the small specimens, 
where a few of the polypes are partly exserted ; they are pale brown. 
Tn one of the specimens the fleshy part of the base is thickened, and 
has contracted so much that the hard axis is exserted nearly an 
inch beyond the base. In this specimen the base of the club is much 
shorter and thicker than in the others. From this specimen I am 
led to believe that the length and slenderness of the club in the 
genus, when in spirit, is preserved by the rigidity of the internal axis. 
These specimens are probably the Lituaria phalloides of Milne- 
Edwards (Coralliaires, vol. i. 217), founded on the Pennatula phal- 
loides of Pallas (Mise. Zool. t. 13. f. 5, 6, 7, 8). 
The second group of specimens were collected by Mr. Rayner in 
Sharks’ Bay, Australia. They are three in number; they are softer 
Proc. Zoou. Soc.—1862, No. III. 
