Knowledge of the Spongida. 247 
élasticité et repoussent vivement le verre qui les comprime 
quand on veut en examiner une parcelle au microscope,” as 
my above description of 1. lobularis will show. 
Halisarea cruenta, n. sp., 1876. 
Smooth, more or less puckered, extending among the de- 
tritus of sea-bottom, and agglomerating the whole on its way, 
so as to give it a dark crimson-red colour, most intense where 
it is most exposed. Consistence firm, tolerably resilient. 
Surface, here and there where uninterrupted by the irregulari- 
ties of the detrital bodies, of glassy smoothness, puckered to- 
wards the projecting points of the latter, and presenting vents 
irregularly scattered on a level with the dermal layer or 
cuticula. Internal structure more or less permeated by the 
branches of the excretory canal-system ; tolerably resilient ; 
crimson colour of the surface, which is seated in an extremely 
thin cuticula, fading off into grey internally; tissue, when 
examined under the microscope, presenting elongated granu- 
liferous cells, rather than the fusiform transparent filaments so 
characteristic of the Chondrosidg and upon which the amount 
of resistance or elasticity in the latter seems to depend, scat- 
tered among the spongozoa and other cells &c. of which the 
body-mass is composed. Ova not seen. Size indefinite, ac- 
cording to the extent of the spreading agglomeration, many 
portions of which are free from foreign objects to the extent 
of a quarter of an inch square and deep, which, when cut out, 
do best for examination. 
Hab. Marine. Spreading among the detrital objects of 
sea-bottom and enveloping every particle in its course. 
Loc. Gulf of Suez. 
Obs. This forms part of the contents of a small jar of or- 
ganisms of a like nature, among which is Chondrilla nucula 
growing over a piece of stony coral, collected by J. K. Lord, 
Esq., in the Gulf of Suez, and presented to the British 
Museum. It seems to be the same species as that previously 
noticed by myself under the above name, in my account of the 
sponges dredged on board H.M.S. ‘ Porcupine,’ in the deep 
sea of the Atlantic Ocean, near Cape St. Vincent (No. 25, 
p- 228), of which the supply was too small for any thing but a 
provisional description ; hence the above emended one. In 
appearance and firmness it is more like Chondrosta than Hali- 
sarca Dujardinit or H. lobularts ; but in composition, from the 
comparative absence of the elastic filamentous element and 
consequent diminution of tenacity, more like the latter, 
