1888.] MR. G. H. FOWI.ER ON A NEW PENNATULA. 135 



cannot, however, at all agree that these groups are of generic rank, 

 and prefer for the present to adopt the generally recognized views 

 on the subject. On this point, when critici-ing my own arrangement 

 of the Vesper-Mice', Dr. Winge writes" : " It is not right to recognize 

 Habrothrix, Oxymycterus, and others as subgenera, and yet at the 

 same time to admit genera of such a low grade as Sigmodon and 

 Neotoma^, which might almost be united to the Old- World Vricetus, 

 or as Rheithrodon and Ochetodon, which do not even deserve sub- 

 generic distinction." 



In answer to this, I can only say that my error, if error it be, in 

 allowing genera of such a low grade as these quoted, will not be 

 mended by the recognitionof more groups, of lower rank still, — groups 

 which I and all other previous authors have only looked upon as 

 subgenera at most. In fact on this point I feel, with Dr. Coues^ 

 that the proper way out of the difficulty will be rather by the lump- 

 ing together of many of the present low-grade genera than by the 

 recognition of more still less strongly marked generic groups. 



EXPLAJSfATION OF PLATE V. 



Fig. 1. Sku\] o( Dco7ni/s ferruffineus ; natural size. 



2-.5. Ditto, upper, lower, side and front views; twice natural size. 



G-7. Lel't upper molars of ditto ; magnified about 7 times. 



8. Right lower molars of ditto. 



9-10. Left upper molars of one of the Cricetinre {Criretus fruincntarms) 



and one of the Murinse {Mus mettadd) ; magnified about 5 and 7 



times respectively. 



5. On a new Pennatula horn the Bahamas. By G. Herbert 

 Fowler, B.A., Ph.D., Assistant to the Jodrell Professor 

 of Zoology, University College, London. 



[Received February 14, 1888.] 



(Plate VI.) 



A fine example of a new Pennatula, sent by Mr. Blake, the late 

 G-overnor of the Bahama Islands, to Prof. E. Ray Lankester, has 

 been handed to me for description : I propose for it the name of 



Pennatula bellissima, sp. n. (Plate VI.) 



Pennatula with 25-29 autozooids on a mature leaf, each with 

 eight strong marginal spines, arranged in 2-3 rows, and continued on 

 to the dorsal surface of the rachis as a single row of immature 



1 P. Z. S. 1884, p. 448. - L. r. p. 144. 



3 I do not think that Dr. Wiuge can have had a specimen of Keofoma before 

 him when writing this remark, as of all the groups of American CriceU none is 

 so distinct or so absolutely different from the rest as this is. The form in which 

 his disparagement of SignWflon and Scotoma is put, however, is a singular com- 

 ment on the results of the pi-esent paper. 

 . ' Mon. N. Am. Rod. p. ?,2 (1877). 



