450 



Messrs. Carpenter, Jeffreys, and Thomson [Nov. 18, 



room-shaped Sponge, in abundance ; Adrasta infundibulum, another 

 Vitreous Sponge allied to Hyalonema ; and other types of the same group 

 not yet described. The Echinodermata also were very numerous, and 

 many of them very large ; and they presented a great variety of most 

 interesting types, nearly all of them being new to the British Fauna, 

 though many had been previously described. It was especially interesting 

 to note the very marked difference between the Echhioderm-Fauna of 

 this region and that of the Cold area. With the exception of a few species 

 which seem able to maintain their existence through almost any range of 

 depth and temperature, they were all diverse ; and whilst the mixture of 

 decidedly Arctic forms, and the dwarfing of Southern types, gave a deci- 

 dedly Boreal character to the Fauna of the Cold area, there was here a 

 mixture of fully developed Southern types, among them a Stichaster either 

 identical with or closely allied to a species described from Madeira. But 

 the specimen of this group most interesting to us (perhaps the most re- 

 markable capture made in the whole of our Cruise) was a large Echinid 

 allied to Astropyga (belonging to the Family Diademidce), having a per- 

 fectly soft and flexible test ; the plates of the corona, though retaining their 

 normal number and arrangement, being very thin and slightly separated 

 from one another by the interposition of a flexible perisome, so that the 

 test resembled an armour of chain-mail, instead of the cuirass with which 

 the ordinary Echinida are enveloped. Two specimens of this remarkable 

 type were obtained, — a perfect one at Station 89, and another, considerably 

 injured, but still serving for anatomical investigation, on our Holtenia- 

 ground. The perfect specimen is about 5 inches in diameter, and of a 

 brilliant shade of crimson, altogether a most striking object. This form 

 at once recalled the very singular fossil from the White Chalk, two speci- 

 mens of which are in the British Museum, described by the late Dr. S. P. 

 Woodward under the name of Echinothuria floris ; and though we would 

 not affirm the actual identity of the existing form with the old, there can 

 be no doubt of their very close affinity, and of the persistence of this re- 

 markable type of structure from the Cretaceous to the present epoch. — 

 Here also we obtained a specimen of almost the only one of the Scandi- 

 navian Starfish that we had not met with on British ground, the Asteronyx 

 Loveni, a very interesting modification of the Astrophyton type, having the 

 same general plan of structure, but having the arms simple, instead of 

 being subdivided in the manner which has given occasion to the designation 

 Gorgonocephalus. It is not a little curious that a dredging we subse- 

 quently took in the Minch, near the eastern shore of Skye, brought up 

 six specimens of this rare Echinoderm, thus confirming a surmise pre- 

 viously formed, that the careful exploration of that channel would show 

 that many types would be there found which have been hitherto supposed 

 to be peculiar to Norway. 



87. The Foraminifera obtained on this and the neighbouring parts of the 

 Warm area presented many features of great interest. As already stated 



