304 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



cirri. There are in addition branchiae of characteristic 



form, cirri, and various other appendages, which, for my 

 present purpose, it is needless to specify. These worms 

 live, on the sea-bottom, in tubes, to be hereafter more 

 fully described, which they form for their own protection. 



The Onuphidae are very closely allied to a much com- 

 moner and better known family, the Eunieidae, but, as 

 Mcintosh has pointed out, they differ from them (amongst 

 other tilings) by one very evident feature, their bathy- 

 metrical distribution ; for whereas the Eunieidae are 

 frequently found between tide-marks, the Onuphidae are 

 characteristic of deep-water, many of them ranging to 

 very great depths. 



Possibly their comparative inaccessibility may account 

 for the fact that, so far as I know, actual observations on 

 their habits have hitherto been unrecorded, though certain 

 conjectures on the subject are made by Dr. Johnson, in his 

 Catalogue of Worms in the British Museum. My own 

 observations, which, as regards living specimens, have 

 been confined to the behaviour of the two British forms, 

 Hyalinwcia tuhicola and Onuphis conchilega, in captivity, 

 clearly show that the conjectures referred to are very wide 

 of the mark. It will be remembered that Johnson draws 

 the picture of Hyalincecia (Nothria) tuhicola, with its quill- 

 like, tapering tube (fig. 1) standing embedded in, and 

 subject to, the pressure of the soft mud in which it is said 

 to live. The anterior portion of the body is supposed to be 

 protruded beyond its tube, and to be raised above the 

 surface of the mud, remaining in this position on watch 

 for prey. He further conjectures that with the forceps-like 

 bristles of the feet, the worm hooks itself to the rim of the 

 lube, and thus obtains a support, without waste of 

 muscular power, k> a long wale])," he says, " being thus 

 rendered less irksome," 



