﻿ix, d, 3 Light: Notes on Philippine Alcyonaria 239 



other hand, have the characteristic stomodseum spicules which 

 are not found in Lemnalioides. The tentacle spicules also, which 

 are numerous in Paralemnalia and Lemnalia, are very few and 

 scattered in Lemnalioides, and may very probably be found to 

 be entirely absent in species as yet undiscovered. 



In 1896 Kukenthal described and figured Ammothea camosa, 

 a new species from Ternate. In his revision of the Nephthyidse 

 (1903), he includes this species in group A of his key to the 

 species of the genus Lithophytum, where its characters would 

 naturally place it as the group was at that time defined. Since 

 that time, two of the five species in this group, L. flavum and 

 L. africanum, have been removed (Kukenthal, 1913) to the genus 

 Lemnalia and two others, L. thrysoides and L. flabellum, to 

 Kukenthal's new genus Paralemnalia. This leaves L. carnosum 

 as the only member of group A remaining in the genus Litho- 

 phytum, and this in spite of the fact that Kukenthal says (1903) : 



Vorliegende Art bildet zusammen mit L. africanum, flavum und digitatum 

 eine natiirliche Gruppe innerhalb der Gattung Lithophytum. 



The excellent figures and description of A. camosa show it to 

 have characteristics which suggest a relationship to Lemnalia, 

 Paralemnalia, and Lemnalioides. The small polyp-bearing area 

 restricted to the anterior portion of the colony; the colony con- 

 sisting of a number of stems united for a part of their length ; 

 and the typical form and size of the spicules, their arrange- 

 ment on the polyps, and their presence (supposedly in consider- 

 able numbers) in the canal walls are all characters which suggest 

 relationship to these genera. The absence of stomodaeum spicules 

 and the absence (or apparent absence) of tentacle spicules pre- 

 vent A. camosa from being included in the genus Lemnalia, and 

 this character together with the branching colony exclude it 

 from the genus Paralemnalia. But the presence of very few 

 tentacle spicules and, possibly, as only one form has been 

 examined, their entire absence is characteristic of the genus 

 Lemnalioides. The form of its cortex and canal-wall spicules, 

 and also their size and arrangement, are strikingly suggestive of 

 Lemnalioides kiikenthali. It seems probable then that a re- 

 examination of the type in the light of the recent changes in 

 the genus Lithophytum would show Lithophytum carnosum 

 (Kukth.) to belong to the genus Lemnalioides proposed in this 

 paper or to be a form connecting that genus with Lithophytum. 



While in many ways the genus Lemnalioides, as the name 

 indicates, approaches the genus Lemnalia to which it is un- 

 doubtedly closely related as I have shown above, the differences 



