486 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



■earlier in the season, for its eggs were found attacked to alga? and eel- 

 grass at the date named. The eggs of this species are small, yellowish 

 white, imbedded in a gelatinous mass, having an annular form, but 

 showing a break or suture on one side. These annular egg-masses are 

 attached by one side to the surfaces of flat algse or eel-grass in large 

 numbers ; they are from .12 to .20 of an inch in diameter. 



The JEolis papulosa was found at Watch Hill, under stones, April 

 12, and with it were long, much convoluted, gelatinous cords, filled with 

 minute pale red or salmon-colored eggs, which probably belong to this 

 species, which is a northern one, and has not hitherto been recorded as 

 from south of Cape Cod. It is very abundant in the Bay of Fundy, and 

 similar egg-clusters are found there under rocks during the entire sum- 

 mer. 



Among and between the stones the northern purple star-fish, Asterias 

 vulgaris (p. 432) is often found at low-water, and also the green sea- 

 urchin, Strongylocentrotus BrobacMensis (p. 406, Plate XXXY, fig. 268) 

 during the spring tides. 



The Balanus balanoides (p. 305) is quite as abundant on the most ex- 

 posed rocks as elsewhere. The minute bivalve young of this species 

 were found just attaching themselves to the lower surfaces of rocks in 

 immense numbers at Watch Hill on the 12th of April. 



Beneath the stones the rock-crab, Cancer irroratus, (p. 312,) is very 

 common, and occasionally the much rarer Cancer borealis is found dead 

 on these shores. It was thus found at Gay Head and No Man's Land, 

 but it is doubtful whether it lives above low-water m-ark. In the 

 lower part of the fucus zone the large Gammarus ornatus (p. 314, Plate 

 IV, fig. 15) is always to be found in great abundance under stones, and 

 in the upper half of the fucus zone the smaller species, Gammarus an- 

 nulatas (p. 314) and Gammarus marinus often occur in great numbers, 

 associated with Jcera copiosa (p. 315) and Idotea irrorata (p. 316, Plate 

 Y, fig. 23.) The Gammarus marinus occurs higher up than either of 

 the other species, and is sometimes abundant even near high-water 

 mark, where the soil beneath the stones is barely moist at low -water. 

 The AmpMthoe maculata (p. 315, Plate IV, fig. 16) is also a common 

 species under stones ; and both green and reddish brown varieties 

 occur. 



Another species of AmpMthoe, of smaller size, was found swimming 

 free in the rocky pools at Watch Hill, April 12. In this the general color 

 was red, or brownish red; the body was transversely banded with pale 

 flesh-color or whitish, alternating with bands of dark red or brown, which 

 are made up of minute crowded specks; the antenna? are aunulated with 

 pale red, and are thickly specked, on the bands and at the base, with 

 darker red. The Hyale littoralis (p. 315) is a small but very active Am- 

 phipod, which is often abundant near high-water mark on the rocky 

 shores, clinging to the Fucus and other alga?, or swimming in the tide- 

 pools. It is capable of leaping actively like the beach-fleas, (Orchestia 



