1899.] ANTIPATHARIAN CORALS OF MADEIRA. 819 



Gen, Aniipathes. 



Shrub-like, branches not. fusing ; spines numerous, strong. Polyps 

 large ; tentacles six, radiating, one pair in a line with the oral 

 slit inserted low down, the others at the margin of the peristome. 



Antipathbs ruKCATA Gray. 



Antipathes fur alia, Gray, P. Z. S. 1857, p. 291. 



Antipathesi furcata, Brook, Antipatharia of the 'Challenger,' 

 p. 104, pi. xi. fig. 2. 



No specimen of this species has been met with by me, but 

 Gray's type, obtained by N. Mason at Madeira in 1857, is in the 

 British Museum. Brook believed it to be only a branch of the 

 entire corallum. The habit is different from that of the other 

 bushy Black Corals of Madeira. In order to enable collectors to 

 identify any specimens that may occur, an abbreviation of Brook's 

 description is here given. 



The specimen is 16 centim. ((3| in.) high. The axis is very 

 slender and bears a number of elongate bristle-like branches, which 

 are directed subvertically and reach to about the same height. 

 The branches give off secondary branches at irregular intervals, 

 and the longer ones bear a third series of branchlets, usually on 

 one side only. Nearly all the branchlets are directed upwards and 

 most of them reach the apex of the corallum, and thus it has a 

 corymb-Hke aspect. The spines are short, triangular, and com- 

 pressed, with the apex at right angles to the axis. Six longitudinal 

 rows can be seen from one aspect, and the spines in a row are three 

 or four times then* own height distant from one another. Polyps ? 



Hab. Madeira (Mason) : British Museum. 



Gen. Antipathella Brook. 



Branching in one plane, branches not fusing together ; spines 

 short, upright ; polyps small, with six tentacles, in two series of 

 three each. 



Antipathblla gracilis (Gray). (Fig. II., p. 820.) 



Antipathes gracilis, Gray, Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. ser. 3, vol. vi. 

 1860, p. 311; not Antipathella gracilis, Brook, Antipatharia of 

 ' Challenger,' p. 113. 



In 1860 Dr. Gray (loc. cit.) gave a short description of a small 

 and dehcate antipatharian from Madeira and assigned to it the 

 specific name gracilis. In 1888 Mr. Brook, when preparing his 

 monograph of the group, was not able to find in the British 

 Museum any specimen from Madeira bearing that name ; but he 

 found there a Black Coral from the West Indies to which was 

 attached a label with the name in Gray's handwriting of Antipathes 

 gracilis. Under these circumstances, Brook in his Eeport described 

 the West-Indian specimen under the name of Antipatliella gracilis 

 (Gray). This was a mistake which he would not have committed 



