﻿15B - MADKEPOEAEIA, 



All the level portions of the inner and outer surfaces consist of a very open reticulum having 

 a granular appearance to the naked eye, whereas the tubercles rising above the inner surface 

 and forming plates and ridges are compact feathery structures. The ridges are thick and 

 pronounced but discontinuous ; they are tallest round the edge, but are distinctly traceable 

 more than half-way down the cone generally as rows of tubercles which are round and swollen, 

 sometimes almost spherical. These tubercles are not confined to the rows, but also frequently 

 form half rings round the lower borders of calicles. The inner surface of the cup is very 

 irregular, there being numerous nearly smooth depressions without ridges or tubercles, these 

 depressions corresponding \vith an elevation on the outer surface of the cone. 



There is only one small bluntly conical specimen of this coral in the National Collection. 

 Another, larger, taller and more pointedly conical, however, has been figured by Mr. Saville- 

 Kent in ' The Naturalist in Australia,' 1897, where it is stated that in life it is of a pale 

 pinkish-red hue, with lighter edges ; it is found in deep water, occurring in distinctly isolated 

 patches many yards square. 



There can be little doubt of the affinity of this coral to M.foliosa, with which it agrees in 

 its being rolled into a deep conical spiral. In M. solanderi the leaves are more open and the 

 spiral coiling not very pronounced. The cones are deeper and more pointed in this type and 

 in 3f. foliosa, while in other forms (of. M. crassifolia) the stocks consist of erect bundles of 

 crumpled and ragged fronds. 



Judging from an examination of the single specimen in the Collection, the lower portions 

 of the cone seem to die down and then to be overrun with fresh coral from the upper Living 

 portion. An epitheca appears under the downwardly creeping layer of coral. In the speci- 

 men here described, there are traces of some four successive overlayings of the base with 

 fresh coral, strengthening it as the coraUum grows slowly in height. 



a. Palm Islands. CoU. SaviUe-Kent. 92. 12. 1. 1. (Type.) 



131. Montipora foliosa. 



This specific name was first used by Pallas (' Elenchus,' 1766, p. 333) to include not 

 only the foliate Montipores, the originals of which he had seen, but also those figured by still 

 earlier writers. His general description runs as follows : — 



The stock consists of a group of leaves showing a rose-like arrangement and either rising 

 from a thick stalk or else from the smooth rock. The leaves are of moderate thickness, rudely 

 petaloid (those near the centre being usually smaller), of varied form, with frilled or folded 

 edges, but irregiilarly as if torn, with both faces very rough as if scraped with a jagged chisel. 

 Small scattered calicles stand up from among the irregularities of both siirfaces of the leaves. 

 From the Indian Ocean. 



Among the specimens seen by Pallas, some were almost perfectly rose-like, sometimes with 

 fewer leaves at the centre. In some the leaves were thiimer and more torn, as for instance in 

 the excellent figure given by Turgot (Mem. Instr., pi. xxii a). In others, again, the leaves were 



