HOLOTHUEIANS OP NEW ZEALAND. 35 



or types were sent to the Colonial and Indian Exhibition, and 

 thence to the British Museum. 



CoLOCHiRus ALBA, Kutton, sp. (PI. 4. figs. 21-32.) 



1872. Chirodota (?) alba, Hutton, Cat. Echinoderm. N. Z. p. 17. 



1879. Echinocucumis alba, Hutton, Trans. N. Z. Inst, vol. xi. p. 307. 



1886. ? Echinocucumis alba, Theel, ' Challenger ' Holothurioidea, 

 p. 119. 



The original description runs as follows : — " Cylindrical, taper- 

 ing behind ; skin reticulated, and with longish papillae on the 

 back and sides ; tentacula ten, large, branched and plumose. 



" White ; skin translucent ; tentacles brownish white, spotted 

 with violet on the inside near the base. 



" Length 1 inch. 



" Wellington Harbour (Zf. Tracers)." 



To this was added in 1879 the following : — " The receipt of 

 another specimen of the Chirodota (?) alha of my Catalogue has 

 enabled me to dissect it, and I find that it has five well-marked 

 ambulacra, and should be placed in the genus Echinocucumis." 



Theel observes that the species certainly does not belong to 

 the genus Echinocucumis, and I find that it is really a Colo- 

 cMrus. 



My own observations have been based upon : — (a) Two speci- 

 mens from the Wellington Museum, in the same bottle, labelled 

 " 33. Chirodota ? alia. Wellington Harbour." (One of these 

 is probably Hutton's type.) (5) One specimen from the Dunedia 

 Museum, labelled ^'^ Echinocucumis alha,^' and probably the 

 specimen dissected by Hutton. (c) One specimen dredged in 

 Wellington Harbour (12 fathoms, mud), and given to me by 

 Mr. H. Farquhar, who had already identified it with Hutton's 

 species. 



The external appearance is very characteristic. The body^ 

 which is only about an inch in length, is bluntly rounded in 

 front and tapers rather suddenly behind to a slender tail, which 

 occupies about | to ^ of the total length of the animal. In 

 three of the specimens the posterior half or more o£ the body is 

 strongly bent dorsalwards, the middle of the body being some- 

 what swollen or bellied. I counted the tentacles in the larger 

 of the Wellington Museum specimens, in which they were weU 

 extended, and found them to be dendriform, ten in number, with 

 the two ventral very much smaller than the remainder. 



rive ambulacral bands of rather conspicuous tube-feet (or 



3* 



