mat 
’ sachusetts Bay. 
on the Southern Coast of New England. 361 
ceeding about two miles farther out, off No-mans-land, the sur- 
face temperature was 62°, and the bottom, in 18 fathoms, was 
583°, showing a decrease of 5° within this short distance, both 
at the surface and bottom. A few miles farther out, at the 
same depth, the bottom temperature was 57°, which was the low- 
est temperature obtained. A short distance west of No-mans- 
land, on a gravelly bottom in 11 fathoms, where cod-fish are 
caught in winter, the temperature was 63° at the surface and 
59° at the bottom. Off the mouth of Narragansett Bay, about 
sixteen miles south from Newport, the depth over a limited area 
1s 29 fathoms, which was the deepest water found. At this 
locality the surface temperature was 62° and the bottom 59°. 
The bottom, in these deeper waters, was generally composed of 
soft mud, filled with innumerable tubes of worms and Amphi- 
crustacea, among which a species of Ampelisca, which 
makes a soft flabby tube, two or three inches long and covered 
with mud, is extremely abundant. At the last named locality 
humerous specimens of the rare and beautiful Hpizoanthus Amer- 
tcanus V. was found coating the shells inhabited by hermit-crabs 
(Eupagurus Bernhardus) and finally absorbing the shells en- 
tirely. This remarkable Actinian has been found previously 
only on two occasions,—first on a deep bank off the coast o 
New Jersey, by Capt. Gedney ; and since in deep water off Mas- 
With this was also found a rare Holothurian 
(Molpadia otilitica), previously known only from specimens taken 
m fish stomachs. 
nella glandula, Modiolaria nigra, M. corrugata, Pecten tenuicosta- 
va (you = P.f iach abe ag undulatum, Chrysodo- 
mus pygmeus (large and abundant), Crucibulum striatum, Mar- 
garita obscura, Cylichna alba; of ANNELIDS, Clymene torquata 
Leidy, Ophelia simplex Leid 
ta sp., Sternaspis fossor, 
‘ iv? Trophon a —? 
Aphrodite aculeaia (large aa common), Nephthys (large species), 
SMpunculus Bernhardus, and species of vereis, Lumbriconereis, 
Aricia, ete. ; of CRUSTACEA, species of Ampelizca (abundant), 
