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all that order of beings, adhere firmly by their 
bafes to fubmarine fubftances. 
This Animal was well known to the ancients 
by the name of the Sea-Pen ; many of the old 
authors took it for a Fucus or Sea-Plant. 
This fpecies of yours has been found in the Ocean 
from the coaft of Norway to the moft remote parts 
of the Mediterranean Sea, and not only dragged up 
in trawls from great depths of the fea, but often 
found floating near the furface. 
Dr. Shaw, in his Hifliory of Algiers, remarks that 
they afford fogreat alight in the night to the fifhermen, 
that they can plainly difcover the fifh fwimming 
about in various depths of the fea. From this ex- 
traordinary property Dodtor Linnaeus calls this fpe- 
cies of Sea-Pen, Pennatula Pbofphorea , and re- 
marks, after giving the fynony ms of other authors. 
Habitat in Oceano fundam illuminans. 
In order to attempt a defcription of it ; the out- 
ward appearance of this Animal is not unlike one 
of the quill feathers of a- bird’s wing, but they are 
found of different fizes from 4 to 8 inches in length; 
this of yours is about 4 inches long; the lower 
half of it, is naked round and white, not unlike 
the quill part of a writing pen ; the upper part 
reprefents that of the feathered part of the pen, 
and is of a reddifh colour, but faded by foaking 
it often in water in order to examine it more 
minutely. This upper half (which arifes from the 
quill and is feathered on both fides) is a little com- 
prefled and becomes fmaller and fmaller till it ends 
in a point at the top ; along the back of this, in 
the fame manner as in the inner fide of a common 
writing pen, there is a groove in the middle from 
the 
