BRITISH SPONGIADJE. 65 



extended the whole length of the sponge. The greater 

 number of them were more or less in a compressed state, 

 but in some there were strong indications that this was due 

 rather to collapse than to natural form. 



The Rev. A. M. Norman sent me four specimens of this 

 species, two preserved in spirit, and two in glycerine, as 

 they came from the sea , none of them presented the com- 

 pressed appearance of the dried specimens, but the greatest 

 diameter of three out of the four was oval rather than 

 circular. At the distal termination of one of these speci- 

 mens there was a mammseformed projection of about half 

 a line in height, that presented an appearance like that of 

 a closed osculum ; no other appearance of oscula were 

 visible. The hispid character is rarely visible in the dried 

 specimens with an inch lens, but when a portion of the 

 sponge has been mounted in Canada balsam it becomes 

 strikingly prominent, and the number of the spicula is so 

 great as to completely obstruct the view of the dermal 

 membrane through which they pass. Their direction is at 

 very nearly right angles to its surface, for about one fifth 

 of their length ; their bases are intermixed with the trans- 

 verse fasciculi of the skeleton beneath, and they penetrate 

 the sponge to the extent of about half the thickness of its 

 parietes. 



In a specimen which I divided longitudinally, nearly the 

 whole of the interior was empty ; towards the base of the 

 sponge there were a few irregularly disposed interstitial 

 membranes, and on these the tension spicula were nearly 

 all more or less fasciculated, but there was no regularity in 

 the disposition of the fasciculi. In the sarcode of these 

 membranes there were numerous small vesicles, filled with 

 minute granules. The vesicles ranged in diameter from 

 about once to twice the greatest diameter of a tension 

 spiculum ; but they were all of them evidently more or less 

 contracted, from having been dried. I did not observe 

 these vesicles in any other part of the interstitial mem- 

 branes. 



The number of the longitudinal fasciculi of the skeleton 

 was from thirty-four to about forty, and their direction. was 



