266 



CHAPTER XVI.* 



CRETACEOUS CRUSTACEA. 



The line, to the importance of which I first drew attention in a 

 paper in the 'Annals ' for 1849t, on Crustacea, and to which I 

 there applied the distinctive name of " nuchal furrow/^ has been 

 also recognized more recently by Professor Milne-Edwards, in his 

 late memoir in the ' Annales des Sciences ' on the nomenclature 

 of the hard parts of Crustacea, in which memoir he applies to it 

 the name " cervical furrow," and suggests that it indicates two 

 rings in the carapace of most Decapods, instead of only one, as 

 heretofore supposed. As the nomenclature of Professor Milne- 

 Edwards is much more elaborate than that of his predecessors, I 

 adopt it here, in the description of the Brachyura in this chapter : 

 the alterations in my former descriptions, necessary to bring 

 them in accordance with the present ones, can be easily made 

 by any interested person studying the French paper referred to. 



Hoploparia Saxhyi (M'Coy). See Plate, fig. 1. 



Desc. Carapace nearly cylindrical, averaging from the edge of 

 orbit to posterior side margin 2 inches 4 lines, width about 

 1 inch 3 lines ; nuchal furrow very strong, 1 inch 3 lines from 

 edge of orbit, and therefore nearer to it than to the posterior 

 end of carapace; entire surface of carapace closely covered 

 with rough, irregularly unequal, pointed granules (averaging 

 five or six in two lines), rather finer on the posterior half: ros- 

 trum broad, depressed in the middle, with a slight elevated 

 mesial line, scarcely reaching the nuchal furrow ; rising on 

 the sides into two prominent, longitudinal, coarsely tubercu- 

 lated ridges, from each of which a row of tubercles extends 

 within half an inch of the nuchal furrow ; on the outer side of 

 each of these rostral ridges, and distant about half the width 

 of the rostrum, is a similar row of five or six tubercles from 

 the edge of the orbit ; cheek-ridges very large, prominent, 

 armed with large projecting compressed spines. Abdominal 

 segments covered with a granulation rather finer and more 



* The species in this chapter date from the 'Annals ' for August 1854. 

 t See supra, page 123. 



