850 



W. M. Bale: 



NeMERTESIA CYLINDRICA Kiich. 



Flumularia cylindrical Kirch., Abh. Nat. \'er. Hamb., vi.^ 



1876, p. 45, pi. i., tig. 1, pi. iv., tigs. 1, lb. 

 Aiitennularia cylindrica, Bale, Cat. Aust. Hydr. Zuupli.,. 



1884, p. 146, pi. X., tig. 7. 

 Sciurdla indivisa, AUman, Chall. Plum., 1883, p. 26, pL 

 v., figs. 1-4. Kirkpatrick, Sci. Proc. Koy. Dubl. Soc. 

 (N.S.), vi., 1890,, p. 609. BiUaid, C.R. Acad. d. Sci., 

 cxlvii., 1908, p. 759. 

 Nemertesia indivim, Billard, Ann. Sci. Nat. (9), xi., 1910,. 

 p. 38. Idem, Siboga-Exp., 1913, p. 60, fig. 5. 

 This species has been referred to diftereiit genera on account of. 

 variations in the arrangement of the hydrocladia in different speci- 

 mens, or even in various parts of the same specimen. Kirchen- 

 pauer described his P. cylindrica as having a doubly pinnate 

 arrangement, one pinna standing in front of another on each side- 

 of the rachis. Kirkpatrick says — '' At first the arrangement of 

 the ramules is bipinnate, each half of the pinna being composed of 

 ramules arranged two deep. Higher up the bipinnate arrangement 

 is obscured, the ramules growing along three or four sides of the- 

 stem, as in Antennidaria.'' AUman says that the hydi'ocladia are 

 "in four longitudinal alternating series"; in other words, that 

 they are in alternating opposite pairs, as in N. decussata. I 

 find, however, in a fragment of his material (for which I am in- 

 debted to Dr. Kirkpatrick), that they are in sets of three, alter- 

 nating with those above and below, so that there are six longi- 

 tudinal series, and all my own specimens are similar to the last. 



There is no doubt as to the identity of A. cylindrica and *S'.. 

 indivisa, Dr. Kirkpatrick having compared type specimens of 

 both; and there seems no reason to doubt that Kirchenpauer has 

 described the same species. Kirkpatrick has remai-ked that 

 Kirchenpauer's figure shows the superacalycine sarcothecae as lower 

 down than those of ^S*. indivisa^ but the difference is very slight, 

 especially in Kirchenpauer's Plato IV. ; moreover, it is accentu- 

 ated by the calycle-margin being shown too high, as Kirchenpauer, 

 like Allman, fails to notice the slight sinuations of the border- 

 where it joins the hydrocladium. As Billard has observed, the- 

 sarcothecae spring from just inside the hydrotheca-margin. 



The British Museum specimen includes several gonangia, which 

 are irregularly lobed, as shown by Billard in his *' Siboga '^ 

 Report , and not as figured by Allman. In all the specimens- 



I 



