IQ2I.] 



Fauna of the Chilka Lake : Polvchaeta. 



621 



jelly, attached to the bottom by a short stalk. He has described the early develop- 

 ment of the worm most carefully, but unfortunately all the adult specimens were 

 lost, and the species was never definitely identified, but was said by Willey, who saw 

 a damaged specimen, to be identical with, or closely allied to, M. teretiuscula, 

 Schmarda, a species differing distinctly from the present form. 



Dr. Annandale further writes that similar spawn is a conspicuous object in 

 shallow creeks and lagoons of brackish water both on the east coast of India and on 



Text -fig. 13'. — Marphysa gravelyi, sp. nov. 



A. Egg-mass, x \. The outer layer has been removed at one spot, showing the clear jelly contain- 

 ing the eggs. B. Laiva, highly magnified. 



that of the Malay Peninsula. It was common at the outer edge of and in small 

 ditches connected with the outer section of the Tale Sap on the Gulf of Siam ' in 

 January 1916, where the mass seemed as a whole more cylindrical than those in the 

 Chilka Lake. In the Chilka Lake the masses are pear- or egg-shaped, often as much 

 as six inches long, and are anchored to the mud, in which the worm burrows to a 

 considerable depth, by a tube at one end. The mass consists of jelly, which is quite 

 hyaline and colourless, and contains the eggs or larvae to the number of several 

 hundreds. The eggs are minute and scattered. The outer part of the gelatinous 

 mass is stiffer than the central part, to which the eggs are confined, and the whole is 



Concerning this lake see Mem. Asiatic Soc. Bengal, VI, pp. 3-6, text-fig. 3 (map). 



