Knowledge of the Spongida. 355 



Wyville Thomson was also present, and observed u that he 

 had taken this species, or at least one very closely allied to it, on 

 the same ground on which he had taken Holtenia Carpenteri 77 

 (ib. Jan. 1870, p. 81). On the 17th June following, Sir 

 Wyville Thomson communicated his paper on Holtenia Car- 

 penteri to the Royal Society, in which, with reference to his 

 proposed classification of the Spongida, he observes : — ■" The 

 typical vitreous sponges appear to approach the Kadiantia 

 through such forms as Tisiphonia and Stelletta " (Phil. Trans. 

 for 1869, vol. clix. p. 714) ; therefore at that period he was 

 acquainted with the characters of u 'Tisiphonia ." In January 

 1870 appeared Dr. Wright's representation and description of 

 the sponge which he had brought before the Dublin Micro- 

 scopical Society on the 15th April, 1869, now named by him 

 u Wyvillethomsonia Wallichii 77 (Quart. Journ. Microscop. 

 Sci. I. c.) ; and on the 3rd of the same month the late Dr. J. E. 

 Gray wrote to me, enclosing a woodcut of a sponge called 

 1 Tisiphonia agaricifbr mis " (which Sir Wyville Thomson, 

 then at Dublin, appears to have used at a lecture, whether 

 published or not I know not), adding that " Bowerbank's 

 figures of the spicules in Tethea muricata are probably 

 those of Tisiphonia^ Wyvillethomsonia^ and Dorvillia re- 

 spectively." This note 1 still have, although the woodcut was 

 returned after I had made a careful tracing of it in my 

 u Journal," where it now is. Subsequently Saville Kent's 

 representation and description of this sponge under the name 

 of Dorvillia agar icifor mis was published in the number of the 

 - Monthly Microscopical Journal ' for December 1, 1870 ; and 

 Sir Wyville Thomson's " woodcut," which is the best repre- 

 sentation that I have seen of this sponge, was used for illus- 

 trating his description of it in ' The Depths of the Sea/ pub- 

 lished in 1873. 



As Dr. Gray had handed over to me two sets of quarto 

 plates of Hyalonema lusitanica and Tisiphonia agariciformis 

 •espectively, which he had received from Sir Wyville Thom- 

 son — evidently drawn for the purpose of accompanying them 

 with letterpress after the manner of his holtenia Carpenteri, 

 had he not been ordered away in H.M.S. 'Challenger' — 

 when he transferred to me all the rest of H.M.S. ' Lightning' 



i 



and 'Porcupine' sponge-dredgiiigs for my examination and 

 publication, 1 thought it only right that these two sponges 

 should be left for him to publish himself on some future 

 occasion, as was stated in my account of the 'Porcupine' sponges 

 ('Annals/ 1876, vol. xviii. p. 471, footnote) ; and this is why 

 1 have not until the present time given any attention to Tisi- 

 phonia agariciformis and its allies beyond their mere mention. 



