296 GEORGE HODGE ON A NEW SAND STAR. 
XXXVIT.—On a new Sand Star of the genus Ophiura ( Ophiura 
Normant), found on the coast of Northumberland and Durham. 
By Grorer Hover. (Pl. XVI.) 
Durine the summer of 1861 whilst dredging at Seaham upon a 
sandy bottom, in water varying from 6 to 25 fathoms, a number 
of small Sand Stars were brought up, associated with Ophiura 
texturata and Ophiura albida. ‘Their actions were so singular as 
to claim a more than ordinary examination; when it was noticed 
that although resembling, in some respects, young forms of O. 
texturata and O. albida, they presented features that at once dis- 
tinguished them from those species—the most striking of which 
were the longer and more attenuated character of the rays, as 
compared with the size of the disc—their excessively lively 
movements, and the wonderful pliability of the rays. These 
several circumstances caused them to be regarded as distinct 
from the two well known species above named: a careful ex- 
amination under more favourable circumstances confirmed this 
opinion. 
The surface of the disc is beautifully rosulated; a large plate 
being in the centre, around which, at a little distance, are arranged 
five other plates; beyond these, other five plates, and so on, the 
interspaces being filled in with circlets of little scales producing 
an appearance not unlike that seen in Ophiocoma bellis. 
At the base of the rays, close to the disc (upon the upper 
surface), is a crescent of short spines, the concave side of the 
crescent being outwards. 
These are features entirely different from what we find in 
in either Ophiura texturata or O. albida; in both instances the 
upper surfaces of the discs present no trace of the beautiful and 
distinct rosulated character here seen; neither do we find the 
crescentic arrangement of spines upon the basal portion of the 
rays. 
The characters of the species under consideration may be thus 
defined :-— 
