1882.] OR RARE SPECIES OF ASTEROIDEA. 123 



MithrDdia VICTORI.B, 11. sp. (Plate VI. figs. 3, 3 a.) 



R = 26-5, r = 3-5 ; R = 30, r = 4-6. Arms five, 4 or 4-2 

 millim. wide at their base, and not diminishing in breadth for some 

 distance from the disk ; integument of the abactinal surface marked 

 out into spaces by the arms of the calcareous skeletal pieces ; a few 

 spines, two or three millimetres long, are to be found along the 

 middle line of the arm ; a few spines, which are generally a little 

 longer, are placed at the upper or abactinal edge of the side of the 

 arm. They frequently exhibit a white and brown patchwork-like 

 coloration, which is due to the arrangement of the pigment in the 

 integument which covers them. The actinal or lower margin of the 

 side of the arm has along it from 7 to 10 spines of about the same 

 length as those on the upper margin. The rather wide ambulacral 

 groove is fringed by a regular series of short blunt spines, which are 

 strongest in the region which falls within the disk. Within this 

 series there is a row of smaller and more delicate spines, of which 

 about five, set in fan-shape, belong to each ambulacral ossicle ; the 

 outer and larger spines may be coarsely granulated. The madre- 

 poric plate is small, white, and rounded, and is set not far from the 

 centre of the disk ; the abactinal surface of the disk presents no 

 characters by which it may be distinguished from that of the arms ; 

 the papulee on the actinal surface are rare. No pedicellariiB detected. 



This new species is to be distinguished from M. claviffera by 

 (1) the rarity of the papular spaces on the abactinal surftice, (2) by 

 the proportionally smaller spines, and (3) by the absence of a row 

 of spines between the ventro-marginal series and the abactinal rows, 

 a row which appears to be constantly present in the better-known 

 form. Judging from the single specimen of M. bradleiji in the 

 collection of the British Museum, that species has much larger 

 papular pores, has two rows of spines on the actinal surface of the 

 rays, and none at all on their abactinal surface. 



Victoria Bank (20" 42' S., 37° 27' W.) ; depth 39 fathoms ; 

 bottom, dead coral. 



Both the specimens from which the above description has been 

 drawn up are injured ; one appears to have lost one of its arms 

 during life, as the free end is healed. They formed part of the 

 collection made by Dr. Coppinger (H.M.S. 'Alert') in 1879-80; 

 but they were not noticed in my report (P. Z. S. 1881), as they 

 did not form a part of the fauna of the Straits of Magellan. 



Fromia indica. 



Fromia indica, Perrier, Rev. des Stellcr. p. 177. 



Scy taster indicus, Perrier, Ann. Sc. Nat. (5)xii. p. 255. 



Although M. Perrier's description states that his specimen has six 

 rays, I have no hesitation in assigning to the species a five-rayed 

 specimen, in which the proportion of R to r is somewhat greater 

 than in the example which formed the object of M. Perrier's 

 description. I base the determination chiefly on the following con- 

 siderations : — The presence of six rays is of itself no evidence in 

 favour of a true polyactinid condition as against a possible heter- 



