318 BULLETIN: MUSEUM OF COMPARATIVE ZOOLOGY. 
The characters by which he (1912, p. 14) separates his brunnea _ 
from pileus are that it is more oblong and egg-shaped, by the opaque 4 
yellow-brown color of the stomodaeum, and by the presence of termi- 
nal knobs on the tentacles. But the specimens from near New York — 
and further south were quite as globular in life as any I have collected — 
elsewhere, though now more or less contracted by preservation. The 
question whether or not the tentacles end in terminal knobs is easily 
settled in life; and in no case did I see anything which could be 
interpreted thus. And the tentacles are sufficiently extended in many — 
of the preserved specimens to show that their calibre is uniform to the 
tip. In many, it is true, these organs are more or less thickened near 
the end; but this is obviously the result of contraction. Most of 
the specimens, as might be expected, are so violently contracted that 
it isimpossible to determine anything about the tentacles. As to color, 
the stomodaeum in many of the southern specimens was of a pale 
reddish hue in life; but I have also found it so in northern specimens. 
Furthermore, the proportional lengths of apical canal and stomo- 
daeum, and the relative level at which the adradial canals join the 
meridionals in the southern specimens are well within the range of 
variation of typical P. pileus.1_ In short there is nothing to separate 
southern from northern specimens except that the former were, as a 
whole, rather smaller. | 
P. brunnea may still be worthy of recognition; but it is not con- 
tained in the Grampus collections, and until specimens agreeing with | 
Mayer’s account are reéxamined, its status will be dubious. 
DISTRIBUTION OF PELAGIC COELENTERATES. 
Pelagic coelenterates fall into two distinct categories according as 
they are, or are not bound to the coast line by a fixed stage, 1. @. 
they are either neritic or oceanic. And though some genera, for 
example Niobia, bridge the gap, they are not sufficiently abundant 
to invalidate the general classification. Among the neritic warm 
water species are Steenstrupia rubra, Laodicea cruciata, Aequorea groen- 
landica and the southern form of Cyanea capillata. Probably Caly- 
copsis typa is also neritic if the term is used in its broad sense, for there 
is reason to believe that it passes through a hydroid stage on the con- 
tinental slope (1909b). Omitting it for the moment, however, because 
1 [ have been able to compare the collection with a large series from northern waters 
