iy isons 
XVI. 
NOTES ON DEPASTRUM CYATHIFORME. 
By G. Y. ann A. FRAS. DIXON. 
[Read May 21, 1890; Received for publication Marcu 24, 1893; Published 
June 18, 1893.] 
Depastrum cyathiforme, Gosse.—We have found this rare 
Lucernarian on both sides of Dalkey Sound. It adheres to the 
under-sides of granite boulders. It is troublesome to keep in 
captivity, as it must be lifted daily out of the water for a couple of 
hours to supply the place of the fall of the tide. It is necessary to 
chip off the piece of stone to which the base adheres, for if removed 
from its attachment it seems to have no power of adhering to any 
new locality. We have never observed a specimen which had 
been detached from its foothold re-attach itself, though it might 
live for some time at the bottom of the tank. 
As this animal has been rarely met with, and never fully 
described, we append a full account of its external form. 
Form.—Urn-shaped when expanded; quarter of an inch in 
diameter, rather more in height; globular and furrowed when 
contracted. In the extended state the animal has a conspicuous 
flexible sta/k, with an irregularly expanded, flat, adhesive foot : 
the stalk forms about half the entire height, and when the animal is. 
contracted assumes an anularappearance. The wmbrella is broadly 
campanulate, its distal end being reflexed or turned out, and 
furnished with numerous over-arching tentacles. The sub-umbrella 
is deeply concave ; half-way between its tentacular edge and the 
mouth (measuring along an imaginary line drawn from the 
tentacles to the lip of the mouth) four buttress-like processes 
issue from the sub-umbrella and stretch across to the mouth, each 
joining the latter at one of its four corners. Between these 
buttresses the sub-umbrella forms deep pouches, each pouch being 
bounded externally, and to a certain extent inferiorly, by the 
