J^me I, iSSo] 



NATURE 



113 



ventral disk, but leaving an opening at the oral centre, whicli is 

 perfectly covered by the apical dome plates. Food-grooves 

 along the vault, closed by two rows of alternating pieces ; in the 

 presence of a porous ventral sac, located posteriorly, and closed 

 at the top, in \\hich the anal functions were subordinate to other 

 offices ; in having the calyx constructed of only three rings of 

 plates alternating -with each other, proximal plates sometimes 

 imperfectly developed ; no interradials. The extreme genera 

 are very distinct, but there are intermediate forms which render 

 it impossible to make a completely satisfactory distinction 

 between successive genera. It is best, no doubt, to recognise 

 (l) the earlier or embryonic types, including Heterocrinus ; (2) 

 the typical Cyatbocrinida:, (3) the Poteriocrinus type, (4) the 

 Teacrinus type, including Woodocrinus, (5) and transitional 

 forms towards Eucrinus, such as Eupachya-imis. Little dilli- 

 cultv is found in referring all Cyathocrinidce from the upper 

 Silurian to the close of the carboniferous to one of the groups 

 Poteriocrinus or Cyathocrinus, although the anal plates vary much 

 in form. In the loner Silurian members of the family this is 

 more difficult, yet careful study gives rise to the idea that the 

 later were probably developed from the earlier Silurian types. 



Circulation in Worms. — The existence of a double circu- 

 latory apparatus in a certain number of types belonging to the 

 class of worms has been known ; it consists of a closed vascular 

 apparatus containing a red blood without corpuscles, and of the 

 connected lacuna; of the body (not properly a distinct organic 

 apparatus), containing colourless blood with white corpuscles. 

 From a sealed packet lately opened in the Belgian Academy it 

 appears that M. van Beneden had discovered in 1S71 a double 

 apparatus and two sanguineous liquids in the lower Arthropoda ; 

 this is found in the genera Clavella, Congei-icola, and Lernanthro- 

 pus. The vascular apparatus with red blood and contractile 

 walls, very simple in the two former, becomes very complex in 

 Leryiauth'yopns. The foliiceous lamellie fixed to the posterior 

 part of the body are true branchiae, organised exactly like thoie 

 of amielids. There is no central organ of circulation ; the 

 circulation of the two liquids is caused by contractions of the 

 body. In Lcinanthropiis the branchiae, abdomen, and cephalo- 

 thorax contract and spread alternately. 



Large Cuttle Fish. — All exact information about gigantic 

 Cephalopoda is of interest not only as showing what immense 

 marine creatures do exist, but as preparing us for the possibility 

 of meeting with still greater. Prof. Verrill has collected a great 

 deal of accurate and recent information as to the North American 

 species, of which he publishes a list in the April number of the 

 American Jotinta! of Science, from which we cull the fol- 

 lowing : — On November 2, 187S, a fi-herman was out in a boat 

 with two other men near Leith Bay Copper Mine, Notre Dame 

 Bay, when they observed some bulky object not far from shore, 

 which they approached, thinking it might be part of a wreck. 

 To their horror they found themselves close to a large fish having 

 big glassy eyes. It was making desperate efforts to escape, and 

 was churning the water into foam by the motion of its immense 

 arms and tail. Finding it partially disabled, they plucked up 

 corn-age and threw the boat's grapnel, which sank into its 

 soft body. By means of the stout rope attached to the grapnel 

 and tied to a tree the fish was prevented going out with the tide ; 

 its struggles were terrific as, in a dying agony, it flung its great 

 arms about. At length it became exhausted, and as the water 

 receded it expired. Its body, from the beak of the mouth to the 

 extremity of the tail, measured twenty feet, and one of the 

 tentacles, or arms, measured thirty-five feet. This is the largest 

 specimen yet measured of Architeiithis princeps. Prof. Verrill 

 mentions eighteen species as now known on the north-eastern 

 coast, of America. 



Sternum in Dinosaurs. — Prof. O. C. Marsh describes, in 

 >Cas. American J ournal of Science iox May, iSSo, the sternum in 

 Brontosaurus excelsns. The Yale Museum has recently received 

 a nearly complete skeleton of tlris, one \oi the largest _knowti 

 Dinosaurs. This huge skeleton lay nearly in the position in 

 which the bones would naturally fall after death, and fortunately 

 the entire scapular arch was in excellent preservation. The 

 coracoids were in apposition with their respective scapulae on 

 each side, and between them lay fe'o flat bones that clearly belong 

 to the sternum. This discovery, as interesting as it was unex- 

 pected, removes the main uncertainty about the scapular arch of 

 Dinosaurs, and likewise indicates a new stage in the development 

 of this structure, not before seen in adult animals. These [two 

 sternal bones are suboval in outline, concave above and convex 



below. They are parial, and in position nearly or quite joined 

 each other on the median line. Tlie anterior end of each bone 

 is con>iderabIy thickened, and there is a distinct facet for union 

 with the coracoid. The posterior end is thin and irregular. The 

 inner anterior margin of each bone is smooth and rounded, and 

 gives no evidence of union with an epiaternal element, which the 

 vacancy there suggests. The amount of cartilage between these 

 two sternal bones or posterior to them is not indicated by the 

 present specimens. They were evidently separated by cartilage 

 from the coracoids. The nearest analogy among living forms to 

 this double sternum may perhaps be found in immature birds. A 

 close resemblance is apparent in the scapular arch of the young 

 American ostrich. If the ossification of the sternum were per- 

 manently arrested at this stage it would afford almost ,' precisely 

 the structure seen in the genus Brontosaurus ; and this is evi- 

 dently the true explanation of the fossil specimens. It is more 

 than probable that in many Dinosaurs the sternum long remained 

 cartilaginous, or so imperfectly solidified that it is not usually 

 preserved. Several specimens of the genus Ca!npto>iolus, found 

 nearly in their natural position, were apparently destitute of an 

 ossified sternum. The large size, end douljtless great age, of 

 the specimen of Brontosaurus above [mentioned may perhaps 

 have been the cause of its more perfectly developed sternum. 



Antipatharia of the "Blake" Expedition. — In vol. iv. 

 No. 4 of the Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology 

 at Harvard College, Cambridge, Mass. (February), L. F. Pour- 

 tales describes twelve species of this interesting group taken in 

 the Caribbean Sea (1878-79). In determining the species an 

 attempt has been made to use the differences in the shape of the 

 polyps, as well as the disposition and form of the spines to draw 

 characters for a much-needed revision of their classification. It 

 would seem as if there were at least two different types of spines : 

 the triangular compressed and the more cylindrical. These latter 

 are generally more densely set, even assuming sometimes a 

 brush-like appearance, as in Antipathes humilis, a new and 

 wonderfully spinous species, figured but not described by Pour- 

 tales. These cylindrical spines are also unequal on the two 

 sides of the pinnules, being longer on the side occupied by the 

 polyps, with a few very much longer around the polyps. The 

 triangular spines are disposed regularly in a quincuncial order 

 around the pinnules, and in a cleaned specimen nothing indicates 

 the place formerly occupied by the polyps. In one species, 

 however, A. desbonni, the spines are in regular verticils. 

 There would appear to be a connection between the shape of the 

 polyps and the shape and disposition of the spines. Those spe- 

 cies with triangular spines have polyps with longer tentacles than 

 those with cylindrical spines, and the tentacles have a greater 

 tendency to become regular in shape. In many species the 

 tentacles are simply contracted ; in a very few they weie found 

 retracted, as figured by Lacaze-Duthiers ; and in some they are 

 probably not retractile at all. Eight out of the twelve named are 

 either described or figured as new species. A. spiralis is a very in- 

 teresting species, formerly referred to A. desbonni, D. and.M. The 

 polyps are alternately large and small, with very large digitiform 

 tentacles, much longer than have been figured of any antipathes 

 before. In the spaces between successive polyps the cxnosarc 

 shows transverse canals, and those on the back part of the 

 branch are more transparent than the rest. 



American (East Coast) Siphonophora.— In the March 

 and April Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at 

 Harvard College, Cambridge, Mass. (vol. vi. 5-7), Mr. 

 J. Walter Fewkcs gives a sketch of the development of the 

 tentacular knob of Physophora hydrostatica ; he describes the 

 mantle-tubes of Apolemia uvaria and Gleba hippopus, the tubes 

 in the larger necto-calyx of Abyla pentagona ; he adds some 

 critical remarks on the genera Halistemma, Agalma, and 

 Agalmopsis, and he concludes with a notice of the forms of 

 Siphonophora and Velellida;, to be met with on the eastern coast of 

 the United States. Up to the present few forms of either of these 

 groups have been described from American waters. They seem 

 to be only occasional visitors blown into the neighbourhood from 

 mid-ocean, and brought there from the tropics by the Gulf 

 Stream. The wealth of such species that one meets with in the 

 Mediterranean is unknown on the New England coast ; while, 

 as the author says, in one day at Nice he has taken eight different 

 genera of Siphonophora;, yet at Newport he has but rarely 

 taken as many as two genera in the length of a summer's day, 

 and a whole summer once passed, during most of which he was 

 almost daily on the water without one species being seen. One 



