IN THE WAKE OF THE 44 CHALLENGER/ 
13 
the marshes the ferns are the great features, especially two 
Osmundas. Here were found nearly all the lichens and fungi. 
The peat burns well, and has the appearance of its ordinary 
European representative. In excavating Bermuda dock a bed 
of lignite was found at 50 feet depth, evidently an ancient peat- 
bog. In the caves the coffee grows wild, the tree being of 
large size. The juniper forms the main feature of the vegeta- 
tion. Common fennel, too, has spread all over the islands. 
About 160 species of flowering plants were collected in the Ber- 
mudas, of which no more than 100 are indigenous. Those of 
West Indian origin were transported, as Gfrisebach suggests, by 
the Gulf-stream, or the general drift of surface-water. The 
occurrence of American plants is probably due to vast numbers 
of migratory birds which come from that continent. These, 
among them the American golden plover ( Charadrias marmo- 
ratus), probably bring a number of seeds, either attached to 
their feet or feathers, or temporarily lodged in their digestive 
tract. A ship laden with grapes had been lately wrecked 
on the coast. Some of the seed germinated, so that General 
Lefroy was enabled to obtain a small number of vines for his 
gardens. 
The Chcdlenger left the Bermudas on April 2 1 , and arrived 
at Halifax on May 9, having worked through 44 stations. After 
a stay of a few days, the ship returned to the Bermudas, 55 
stations having been explored. On Thursday, June 12, the 
Challenger left the Bermudas en route for the Azores. On this 
voyage some fine specimens of a magnificent barnacle were 
hauled up, attached to curious nodules, consisting almost en- 
tirely of peroxide of manganese, much resembling certain 
nodules dredged up 700 miles eastward of Sombrero Island. 
This cirriped,* Scaljpellum regium (fig. 2), is by far the largest 
of known living species of the genus, a female specimen having 
an extreme length of 60 millimetres, of which the 44 capitulum ” 
was 40 more, and the “peduncle” 20 more in length. The 
latter was covered with imbricated scales and coarse hairs, and 
the valves were 14 in number. In two of the specimens there 
was no trace either of testes or of intermittent organ, but the 
ovaries were well developed. In nearly all 44 complemental 
males” were to be seen, from five to nine in number, attached 
within the 44 occludent margins,” in a fold of the body-sac 
quite free from the valve. The male (fig. 3) is very simple, 
being oval and sac-like, and about 2 inches in length. It has 
no rudiments of valves, nor is there a trace of a jointed 
thorax to be seen, even after boiling in caustic potash. The 
* See article u Barnacles : their Facts and their Fictions.” — Popular 
Science Be view, Oct. 1873. 
