eet 
Station 83 (?) 
Only one specimen of this rare deep-sea species was received by 
‘me. 
The ovoid body is speckled with pale-red dots, due to the coloured 
phosphatic bodies in the skin; the body towards the posterior end is 
abruptly narrowed and prolonged backwards as a white tail. 
The total length is 28 mm., of which the tail occupies 7 mm. ; the 
greatest breadth of the body is 18 mm. 
The only essential difference between this and Théel’s type speci- 
men, which was imperfect, and was captured off the East Cape at a 
depth of 700 fathoms, appears to be that the majority of the cal- 
careous plates (or “ tables”) present only 3 or 4 perforations instead 
of 6. 
Locality.—Cape Kidnappers, 68-78 fathoms, soft mud.* 
Clark (see pp. 17-21) goes fully into the reasons for merging both 
Ankyroderma and Trochostoma in Cuvier’s genus Molpadia. On page 
143 the chemical analysis of the curious coloured bodies in the skin 
is given: they consist chiefly of phosphate of iron, with a little lime, 
and perhaps magnesium. 
Molpadia dendyi sp. nov. 
Plate XI, figs. 1-3. 
A single specimen; colour, deep maroon-red with a purplish 
tinge. Length, 65mm., of which the white tail measures 15 mm. ; 
diameter of body, which is rather shrunken, is 20mm.; the tail is 
2mm. across. The oral region, which was not retracted, measures 
455mm. The tentacles, of which there are, I think, 15, are with- 
drawn, and, as far as I can make out, are short and rounded, and 
possess only one pair of minute processes near the tip. 
The purplish skin, which is a good deal wrinkled, and covered with 
a fine grey mud in the folds, is s en when viewed under a dissecting- 
lens to be dotted with more or less distant pale spots where the ver- 
tical spines of the calcareous “tables” project through the layer 
of coloured ovoid concretions. On one surface of the body, which is 
the more convex, these spines project further beyond the surface. 
The deposits in the integument are of two kinds—(a) orange-brown 
concentrically-marked ovoid or spherical phosphatic bodies, and 
(b) caleareous “tables”’ of the usual form. Over the greater part 
of the body the former constitute the chief feature, being densely 
massed, the tables being more or less isolated. On the tail, however, 
matters are reversed: the calcareous perforated plates are larger 
* This probably came from Station 83, though both this number and “‘ 30” 
were on labels in the jar; but, as this species has never been obtained off Gamaru 
(Station 30) in the various dredgings, whereas it, like all its allies, does occur 
in deep water, and a deeper sounding was at Station 83, I have placed it as above 
