jan. — mar. 1857.] voyage from England to Madras. 161 



to produce such remarkable aberrations in species ; it is however 

 more elongated in form, and its lateral spines are less produced. 

 Its deep brown color is worthy of note among shells most of which 

 are of glassy transparency. In the net with these were several spe- 

 cimens of Ianthina exigua and three or four Cleodoras, larger and 

 of a more elegant and curvilinear form than the last. Their general 

 appearance is well depicted in Fig. 21. The animal is provided with 

 two alar appendages of considerable size and moves rapidly, 



June 18th, Lat. 1.12 S. Long. 78-44 E. This evening just before 

 dark many specimens of Ianthina fragilis floated by the ship. What 

 first attracted our attention was the dead ivhite appearance of their 

 vesicular floats which we could thus readily distinguish from the 

 particles of foam caused by the motion of the ship, we soon captur- 

 ed in our net a considerable number of them in very perfect condi- 

 tion, [see Fig. 4.] the shell is covered with a very delicate epiderimis 

 the animal when handled exudes a purple stain ; when in a state of 

 repose on the surface of the water the shell is entirely submerged 

 the float only being above the surface except that it occasionally 

 raises its proboscis and mouth armed with numerous slender curv- 

 ed teeth visible to the naked eye ; the float is attached to the foot of 

 the animal from which it could be readily detached or peeled off, ap- 

 parently without injuring the animal. Most of the specimens taken 

 were the I. fragilis hut among them were three examples of the Ian- 

 thina globosa Fig. 5. This shell is in color a deeper blue and it wants 

 the carinated form of I. fragilis. The floats of these molluscs have 

 been repeatedly described and commented upon by authors. It was 

 observable that the float oil. globosa was more loosely constructed 

 and of a more irregular form than that of /. fragilis. One of the 

 former had the lower part of its float studded with egg capsules, 

 having the appearance of a cluster of small pendulous blue vesicles, 

 each of which, when examined under a microscope, was found to 

 contain numerous minute ovules of a pale blue color. Shortly after 

 8 p.m. we got several additional specimens of Cleodora, Fig. 8 21 

 and about 9 p. m. a small specimen of Argonauta, Figs. 

 1 and 2 — not the Argonauta argo, but an allied species of a horn 

 color, having a broader keel and fewer tubercles. The animal be- 

 longs to the Caphalopoda, already mentioned as the highest class 



