180 
Z. ASTEROIDA. 
VlRGULARIA. 
thickness throughout, and exhibits no mark of attachment at either 
end. When broken, it exhibits a radiated surface, like the broken 
spine of an echinus. The axis appears to have little connection with 
the fleshy part, and to consist of concentric layers deposited by the 
soft parts surrounding it. When a portion of the axis is broken off 
from either extremity, the animal retracts at that part, so as con- 
tinually to expose a fresh naked portion of the axis : hence we can 
take out the axis entirely from its soft sheath, and we always find 
the lower pinnae of the animal drawn up closely together, as if 
by the frequent breaking of the base. These very delicate and brit- 
tle animals seem to be confined to a small circumscribed part of the 
coast which has a considerable depth and a muddy bottom, and the 
fishermen accustomed to dredge at that place believe, from the clean- 
ness of the Virgularise when brought to the surface, that they stand 
erect at the bottom with one end fixed in the mud or clay. Mul- 
ler’s specimens were likewise found on a part of the Norwegian coast 
with a muddy bottom. The Polypi , much resembling those of the 
common Lobularia digitata, are long, cylindrical, transparent, marked 
with longitudinal white lines, and have eight tentacula which pre- 
sent long slender transparent filaments or cilise on each of the lateral 
surfaces when fully expanded. The polypi are easily perceived ex- 
tending through the lateral expansions or pinnae, to near the solid 
axis, where we observe two transverse rows of small round white ova 
placed under each pinna, and contained within the fleshy substance. 
These ova appear to pass along the pinnae, to be discharged through 
the polypi, as in the Lobularia, Gorgonia, Caryophyllea, Alcyonia, 
&c.” Grant. 
The figures in our plate were drawn from specimens with which 
I was favoured by Dr Coldstream, and which had been preserved for 
some time in spirits ; but to shew the difference between the animal 
in this contracted condition and when alive, I have placed beside 
them Figures 5 and 6, copied from Muller. The dissimilarity between 
figures taken in these different states has rendered the synonymy of 
the species perplexed and almost inextricable. According to Cuvier, 
Lamarck, and Blainville, the species delineated by Muller, and which 
is certainly identical with the British one, is not synonymous with 
the Linneean ; but this opinion rests solely upon the circumstance 
of Linnaeus having quoted a figure in the “ Mus. Ad, Fr.” — -belong- 
ing confessedly to another Zoophyte — as a representative of the spe- 
cies he intended, which may have been done from the then un- 
certainty of the limits of the species, or from having seen specimens 
in spirits only. His character is very applicable to our animal, — 
