MUSEUM OF COMPARATIVE ZOOLOGY. 37 
The ccenenchyma is composed mainly of smaller, rudely warted and spinu- 
lated, irregular, more or less fusiform, and often crooked spicules, varying 
much in size and shape (Fig. 5a, 7-1). Some measured .76 by .14, .57 by .10, 
57 by .08, .55 by .10, .44 by .05, .88 by .14, .28 by .14mm. With these are 
some that are forked or bilobed (.63 by .24, .52 by .24 mm.), and a few com- 
pound ones, all roughly warted. 
This species was dredged off Martha’s Vineyard by the U.S. Fish Commis- 
sion, in 1882, in 234 fathoms. A number of specimens have been obtained by 
the Gloucester fishermen, from the fishing banks off Nova Scotia, and from the 
Grand Banks, in deep water. The original example was from the Grand 
Banks, with Primnoa reseda. 
Paramuricea grandis VERRILL, sp. nov. 
Plate III. Figs. 3, 3a, 3b. 
This is a large, stout, subflabellate species, growing to the height of two feet 
or more, with the main branches often half an inch or more in diameter. The 
branches fork several times, diverging widely at the axils, and then ascending, 
and having a tendency to lie nearly in one plane. 
The branches are much stouter and the calicles more numerous than in 
P. borealis ; they are usually nearly in contact at their bases, leaving very lit- 
tle of the ccenenchyma exposed, and are seldom separated by spaces equal to 
their diameters. The calicles form prominent verruce, swollen at the base, 
and scarcely as high as broad ; the margin is crowned by eight slight, angular 
denticles, from which the small marginal spines scarcely project in alcoholic 
specimens, and only slightly in dry ones ; the sides of the calicles are nearly 
smooth except near the margin. 
In alcoholic specimens the whole surface of the calicles and cenenchyma is 
covered with a nearly smooth soft dark brown skin, concealing the spicula. 
The polyps are capable of being entirely retracted within the calicles. Many 
are, however, only partially retracted, and show the circular series of slender 
bow-shaped spicula around the polyps and the convergent groups of slender 
curved spicula on the tentacles, as in P. borealis, but they are smaller in this, 
and not at all spinose. 
The ccenenchyma is rather thick, but filled with irregular spicula, many of 
which are flat and irregularly lobed and branched. The axis is black in the 
main branches ; soft and yellowish brown in the smaller ones. When dried 
the ceenenchyma is dark brown or nearly black. 
The projecting, flattened, spinose spicules of the calicles (Fig. 3a, c, d) have 
rather broader, flatter, and stouter points than those of the preceding ; the point 
which projects is roughened or rudely spinulated along the edge ; the basal 
portion is strongly flattened, commonly longer than broad, and usually com- 
prises considerably more than half the whole length; it is sometimes oblong, 
sometimes more or less triangular ; the sides and base are more or less deeply 
