250 Mr. H. J. Carter’s Contributions to our 
family now ; for it evidently belongs to our order Carnosa, and, 
possessing spicules, to our family Gumminida ; but very little 
of the filamentous element, as may be learnt from Schmidt’s 
and Kélliker’s observations, appears to exist in it; indeed, 
Schulze could not see any at all (No. 33, p. 422). It is pre- 
sent, however, in Cortictwm abysst, but here very scanty, 
especially in the body-substance ; hence the want of tenacity 
displayed in tearing a portion of the latter to pieces with 
needles, compared with Chondrosia and Chondrilla, in both of 
which this elastic filamentous trama abounds. 
In 1868, Schmidt added another species from the Adriatic 
Sea (No. 9, p. 25, Taf. ii. fig. 6), which he named C. stelli- 
gerum; and in the same publication (p. 2, Taf. i. fig. 11), 
another from the coast of Africa, which he named Corticiwm 
plicatum, in which the spicules are allied, in their tetrac- 
tinellid form, to those of Corticewm abysst. ‘The latter I de- 
scribed and figured from a specimen found in the “ deep 
sea’? at the entrance of the English Channel (No. 17, p. 18, 
pl. i. figs. 1-9). I have just stated that the filamentous 
element is very scanty in Corticium abysst, which probably 
accounts for its amount of tenacity beimg tar less than that 
of Chondrosia and Chondrilla, approaching therefore nearer 
to that of Halisarca lobularis. But it is not identical (iden- 
tisch) with Samus anonyma, Gray, as supposed by Schmidt 
(No. 31, p. 69), which may be seen by my descriptions and 
figures of these sponges respectively (No. 28, p. 350, pl. 
xxix. figs. 1-4, and No. 30, p. 59). 
My species (named pro temp.) Corticium Kittonit is only 
conjectural, being provisionally inferred from the tetractinellid 
form of some spicules hitherto only found among the detritus 
of sea-bottom at Colon, Panama (No. 22, p. 24, pl. xv. 
figs. 48, a-e) ; while C. parasiticum from the “ deep-sea” 
was not sufficient in quantity for much more (No. 25, p. 229, 
pl. xvi. fig. 52). 
Oorticium versatile, from St. Vincent (West Indies), is 
another species lately (1880) adverted to by Schmidt, who has 
unfortunately devoted much more to the possible “ combina- 
tions” of its tetractinellid form of spicules than to a descrip- 
tion of the sponge itself (No. 31, p. 69, Tat. ix. fig. 5). All 
that is stated of it is that it is a “ Crustenschwamm,” to 
which are added figures of the spicule in the plate (7. c.), but 
nothing else. From the form of the flesh-spicule not having 
been given, if, indeed, there was any, [ cannot speak with cer- 
tainty ; but the skeleton-spicules are very like those of Samus 
simplex (No. 30, p. 60, pl. v. figs. 26 a-c), which, of course, 
