ON THE MARINE FAUNA OF SOUTH DEVON AND CORNWALL. 199 



Here, in from forty to sixty fathoms, we have invariably met with 

 some of our most interesting forms, such as are considered of the rarer 

 species belonging to our British fauna. 



Hitherto among Crustacea we have taken species of Nika, Typton, 

 Nephropsis, Caridina, Callianassa, and other forms that have generally 

 been considered as very rare, and this year we have taken, at a depth 

 of fifty-five fathoms, a considerable number of Pagurus sculptimanus of 

 Lucas, a species that the late Prof. Bell has described in his ' History of 

 British Stalk-eyed Crustacea,' under the name of Pagurus forhesii, under 

 the impression that it was an undescribed form — a single specimen of 

 which was sent to him with others from the coast of Falmouth. 



This is the first time that this species has been taken in British 

 waters since Bell received his specimen, which is now in the British 

 Museum (whither we propose sending some of the recently dredged 

 specimens), from the late Dr. Cocks, some thirty-five or forty years since ; 

 a fact that appears to suggest that the word ' rare,' as used in relation 

 to our knowledge of species, merely represents our want of knowledge of 

 the natural habitat of the animal. 



An example of this may be seen in the following passage from Pro- 

 fessor Bell's work on Pohjhius lienslowii, ' which is very local in its dis- 

 tribution, and probably nowhere existing in great numbers'; whereas 

 I have recently been informed by Mr. F. Day, that it has been thrown up 

 on the shores of Mount's Bay, this spring, after a strong south-western 

 gale, in such quantities that it is thought that along the shore there 

 could not have been less that two tons in weight. 



Again, the little crustacean which Bell has described as Thysanopoda 

 couchii, and of which he states, on the authority of Couch, that it is found 

 in ' myriads in the stomach of the mackerel and other fish,' Mr. Couch 

 had not found since, although he was in the habit of searching the 

 stomachs of mackerel and other fishes. Our experience is confirmatory 

 of that of Mr. Couch, inasmuch as we have only obtained it one season, 

 and then in abundance from the stomachs of fish. And recently we have 

 had our attention drawn to a parallel fact in the Indian seas, from 

 whence Professor Milne-Edwards described, under the name of Acetes 

 indicus, in 1829, a small crustacean, that, as far as we are aware, has not 

 been noticed since ; yet Sir Walter Elliot has given us a carefully drawn 

 figure of the same, with the remark that it was found in the stomach of 

 a very large Dicerobetes, taken off the coast of Malabar in such quantities 

 that basketfuls were carried away by the fishermen, and thousands left 

 scattered about the shore. 



In referring still to the Crustacea we beg to draw attention^ to the 

 fact that many of the specimens recorded from this locality — that is, from 

 the deeper water at the entrance of the English Channel — are species that 

 are common to the Mediterranean Sea, while others, such as Mtmida- 

 barnficus, as also others of less noticeable forms, have their centre of 

 radiation near the arctic zones. 



Although it has been several times demonstrated that deep-sea species 

 have a large geograpical distribution, yet it is interesting to observe that 

 some of our long-shore species have been represented by specimens that 

 appear to be identical in the eastern seas. Thus the common Grangon 

 vulgaris has its representative at Japan, or one that cannot, on the closest 

 analysis, be distinguished from it. This is also found to be the case with 

 one of our specimens ofCa^prella {Gap-ella ccpiilibra) as well as other species. 



