60 Proceedings of the 



My next examination was on the 2d of April. After giving them a sup- 

 ply of sea water, they were still fixed; I could, however, perceive a dif- 

 ference, the centre of the head more raised and cone-shaped, and the 

 arms shorter. I continued my examinations daily ; and on the 6th, in- 

 stead of moored creatures, I had a fleet of probably one hundred minute, 

 free, naked-eyed, medusoid-like beauties (Fig. 2), jerking about in all direc- 

 tions, with the exception of size all alike, perfectly transparent; the umbrella 

 well rounded and pilose ; the sub-umbrella large ; each had four large 

 ocelli-like bulbs on the edge of the mantle, furnished with a stiffly turned - 

 up tentacle, tipped with a disk having a dark centre ; this surrounded by 

 a light ring, and outside a darker edge, dark but short bars arranged in 

 a quincunx manner on these tentacula. The ocelli were composed of mi- 

 nute, dark granules. As well as these long tentacula, there were four 

 smaller and shorter ones, also turned up, but no ocelli where the edge of 

 the mantle is shown. On the lower part of the mantle runs a canal com- 

 municating with the bulbs of the large tentacula ; in the canal I observed 

 a granular circulation passing along, and, as if revolving in the bulbs and 

 a short way down each large tentacle ; into these bulbs smaller granules 

 descended from the sub-umbrella, by the gastro -vascular canals ; these 

 canals extended to the upper part of the stomach, the stomach being at- 

 tached to them, and is rounded on the upper part, and divided into four 

 lobes ; it then narrows and runs out bell- shaped to the quadrate mouth, 

 which has four long lips fimbriated at the tips. They were very active 

 up to the 10th, when some little change took place. I supplied small 

 quantities of water, and used every precaution, from being anxious to see 

 all I could of them. On the 11th they became sickly, and the upper part 

 of the umbrella in eight festoons, the tentacula slightly drooping. On 

 the 13th, nearly inactive, hyaline, and turned inside out. I began to hope 

 that, as the mouth had become elongated into a peduncle-like form, they 

 were about to become fixed again ; they, however, dwindled away, and 

 although I kept the water for months, I could trace nothing more. I 

 have not yet seen Steenstrup's work on " The Alternation of Genera/' 

 therefore am unable to say whether it may be one of the interesting facts 

 noticed by him. They differed in the fixed state from any of the 

 zoophytes figured and described by Johnston ; and when free from all the 

 naked-eye medusse figured in the monograph of Forbes, it may be one of 

 the latter in its earlier stages, and probably is, from being pilose, this 

 being the case with many of the young of the medusoid tribe which have 

 fallen under my notice, and I have seen many. This is the most interest- 

 ing of all. The most like the free state, is Lizzia octopunctata of 

 Forbes, PI. xii., fig. 3 ; it agrees thus far in the form of the umbrella, in 

 having 8 tentacular bulbs, 4 gastro- vascular canals, the shape of the sto- 

 mach, quadrate mouth, and long fimbriate-tipped lips. It differs in being- 

 pilose, and having only 8 tentacula, instead of 20, viz., 3 at each large 



