Bate.—Hydroids from the New Zealand Coast. 249 
From Dunedin Museum I have one of Coughtrey's specimens of this 
most variable species. If differs somewhat from his figures, having more 
compact internodes, with hydrothecae less divergent at base and more 
so above. Specimens from Port Philip agree more perfectly with: the 
e nodes at this part are very oblique, and are sometimes referred to 
inaccurately as “ twisted joints.” 
The variations depend on the respective sizes of the colonies and of their 
several parts, degree of distinctness and obliquity of nodes, com 
present. Another specimen from the same locality has nodes transverse, 
with hydrothecae more divergent ; its hydrorhiza is stout, filiform, dark 
in colour and not reticulated, being the most conspicuous part of the 
colony ; and it has no trace of marginal loops. e peduncles of shoots 
in this form are more robust, and have two, sometimes three, fusiform 
internodes following apophysis. A very similar form from Akaroa is 
from the Busk collection in British Museum, and another, with up to 20 
internodes, is from “ New Zealand.” On one or two of these varieties I 
noticed instances where a joint was quite wanting, so that an internode 
of 4 hydrothecae was formed. 
Mulder and Trebilcock also mention having observed several varietal 
forms, some with the characteristic markings of the hydrorhiza, and others 
without them. These observers have called attention to the existence 
in this species and its allies of minute apertures near the bases of some 
of the internodes, often surrounded by delicate tubular processes. 
Hilgendorf has noticed that the shoots spring from points of the hydro- 
rhiza at which branching occurs; this character is not, however, constant, 
as he suppose 
Idia pristis Lamouroux. 
Idia pristis Farquhar, 1896, p. 467: Campenhausen, 1897, p. 311: Jäderholm, 
.. 1908, р. : Billard, 1907a, p. 351; 1910, p. 16: Ritchie, 1910a, p. 820; 
19105, p. 11: Stechow, 1913, p. 141: Levinsen, 1913, p. 315. 
Idiella pristis Stechow, 1919a, p. 106; 19195, p. 19. 
Jaderholm and Campenhausen considered the form described by Allman 
was a distinct species; Billard, after examining Allman's types, does not 
concur. 
