12 N. Annandai^e : The Fauna of Brackish Ponds. [Vol. II, 



faint yellowish tinge. The complexity of budding is well illustrated 

 b}^ the accompan3dng figure (fig. i) of the upper part of a parent 

 zooecium with its buds of the first , second, third and fourth degrees. 

 As a rule buds of the first degree arise direct from the upper part 

 of a large zooecium, but sometimes a short tubular outgrowth 

 intervenes, such outgrowths being more common in the case of 

 buds of younger generations. A common form of what w-e may 

 take as the unit of the colony {viz.^ a parent zooecium and its direct 

 offspring produced b}' budding) is that of an upright stem (the 

 parent zooecium) with a single antler-like branch, consisting of buds 

 and their buds , at one side ; but two or more such branches are not 

 infrequently produced. 



No trace of resting buds was found in specimens killed on Decem- 

 ber 24th. 



Fig. I. — -V . bengalensis. Port Canning, Dec. 1907.. 



In the following points the Indian species dift'ers from the 

 European examples of V. pavida I have examined : — 



( i) in the small size of the swelling from wdiich the zocecia arise ; 



(2) in the fact that a considerable number of zocecia are fre- 



quently grouped together with very short intervening 

 false stola ; 



(3) in the more powerful development of the gizzard ; 



(4) in the fact that the distal part of some of the adult zooecia 



is approximately circular in cross-section. . 

 In the first two of these points, and to some extent in the 

 lourth, V. bengalensis resembles Rousselet's recently described 

 V. symbiotica ' from Lake Tanganyika ; but we have no details of 

 the anatomy of this African form, which was found growing in 

 the substance of a freshwater sponge very much in the same 

 way as the coralloides phase of Plumatella fruticosa grows in 



I Proc. Zool. Soc, 1907 (i), p. 255, The colonies seen by Mr. Rousselet were 

 apparently devoid of lateral buds, but so are many examples of V. bengalensis. 



