18 (Bulletin of the (Natural History Society. 
tance. It is a Comatula, one of that division of the Crinoids- 
in which the adult is free but the young is stalked. But 
there is some question about its exact identity. Dr. Stimpson 
in his Synopsis tells us that he dredged a single specimen of 
a Comatula in twenty-five fathoms near Duck Island, Grand 
Manan. He referred it, though doubtfully, to Alecto (now 
Antedon) Esclirichtii, finding differences which he thought 
might be due to age, as his specimen was only four inches in 
diameter, while those with which he compared it were at least 
ten. Dr. P. II. Carpenter, in his forthcoming report (Y), on 
the Crinoids of the Challenger expedition (for advance 
sheets of which the writer cannot sufficiently thank him), 
suggests that Stimpson’s specimen may have been Antedon 
quadrata, a smaller species of similar distribution which very 
greatly resembles and is very closely allied to Antedon 
Esclirichtii. Small specimens of the latter species, together 
with the former species were dredged by the “ Challenger ” 
off Nova Scotia, at the same locality on Le Have Bank, 
latitude 43° 4' N., longitude 04° 5' W., this being the most 
southerly known locality for both species. The known facts 
of distribution of the two species, therefore, do not help 
us, and as Dr. Stimpson’s specimen was probably lost in the 
great Chicago fire of 1871, in which so much of his valuable 
material was destroyed, the question can now only be settled 
by its re-discovery. Whichever it may prove to be, it certainly 
is very rare in the Bay of Fundy, for the thorough dredgings 
of the United States Fish Commission failed to discover it. 
How the two species may be distinguished will be pointed out 
in the description of A. Esclirichtii. 
Of Ophiuroids we have six species, all of them rather 
common forms. The most interesting is Gorgonocephalus 
( Astrophyton) Agassizii, the basket-fish, which is found upon 
the southern coast, on Bradelle Bank, and at one or two 
other points in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. 
Of true Starfishes we have eleven species, all of them of 
rather wide distribution, but some of them remarkable either 
for beauty of coloring or the arrangement of their hard parts. 
Goniaster i^hrygiana or Crossaster papposa are examples of 
