Miscellaneous. 223 



On a new attached Grinoid, Democrinus Parfaiti,/rom the Dredgings 



of the ' Travailleur/ By M. E. Perkier. 



Among the results of dredgings made at great depths none have 

 excited a more lively interest than the discovery in the living state 

 of forms which were believed to have long since disappeared. 

 Among the fossil Invertebrata there are few that, during the Pri- 

 mary and Secondary periods, played so important a part as the 

 attached Crinoids, and are so badly represented in existing nature. 

 When, in 1755, Guettard announced the existence of a living Pcn- 

 tacrinus in the West Indies, it was almost a scientific event ; for a 

 long time this species remained the only representative of a group 

 which was formerly extraordinarily varied and so rich in individuals 

 that its representatives must sometimes have formed vast submarine 

 prairies. Slowly other types have been added to the list, nearly all 

 found in deep seas ; so that the order of the attached Crinoids is 

 now represented by fourteen species. These are as follows : — Pen- 

 tacrinus asteria. Mutter i, decorus, Wyville-Thomsoni, Madearanus, 

 Blakei, and alternicirrus, Rhizoerinus lofotensis and llawsonii, 

 Batht/crinus gracilis and Aldriehianns, Hoi opus Rangii, Hyocrinus 

 BethdlianitS) and Hyponome Sarsii. 



The dredgings of the ' Travailleur ' have just revealed the exist- 

 ence of a fifteenth form, brought up from a depth of 1900 metres 

 on the coast of Morocco, off Cape Blanc. We propose to give this 

 new Crinoid the name of Democrinus Parfaiti*. 



Democrinus is distinguished at once from all the other genera by 

 the constitution of its calyx, which is formed of five long basals 

 constituting of themselves a funnel-shaped calyx ; a circular groove 

 separates these five basals from five rudimentary radials, which are 

 crescentiform, alternate with the former, and are themselves sur- 

 mounted by five free, movable, rectangular axillary radials, to 



I which, respectively, are attached five arms, much broader than the 



radials. These arms break very easily at the level of their articu- 

 lation with the axillary radials, which then fold down upon the roof 

 of the calyx ; of three specimens that we have been able to examine, 



\ two are completely destitute of arms, and the third only presents 



very short remains of them, from which it is easy to see that the 

 arms must have had an extremely small development ; but we can- 



f not ascertain whether or not they bore pinnules. In Rhizoerinus 



and Hyocrinus the arms are simple, as in Democrinus ; but in the 

 former the basals are amalgamated and the calyx is partly formed 

 by radials ; and in the second the first radials are larger, soldered 

 together, and also take part in the formation of the calyx. More- 

 over, in the latter the roof of the calyx is eovered with calcareous 

 plates. Like the Rltizocrini, the Democrini, of which the peduncle 

 is destitute of cirri, are attached to the ground by a greatly deve- 

 loped radicular apparatus. 



Of all the existing attached Crinoids the Democrini are those in 



* We dedicate the species to the commander of the ' Travailleur/ 

 M. T. Parfait. 



