9 
April 10 saw us back in Ascension Bay. Quite shallow for 
the most part, like Espiritu Santo it is somewhat larger, per- 
haps 8 miles across the entrance and varying from 5 to 11 miles 
wide inside. It extends back into the land some 16 miles. This 
great bay has about everything a marine biologist could want in 
the way of good collecting grounds: a barrier or fringing reef, 
coral studded flats and muddy shoals, turtle grass in abundance, 
rocky shores, tide pools, lovely beaches, lagoons, extensive 
mangrove swamps, deep water not too far outside the reef, and, 
for tropical insect life, a variety of habitats in the xerophytic 
"bush" on shore. 
The first biological surprise was the swarming of the little 
dark, brownish-looking, blue-speckled jellyfish that were hasten- 
ing by the ship the morning of April 14. Literally thousands 
of half-inch high, slightly wider, "thimbles ” seemed to be spinning 
clockwise, rushing along in several streaks or bands. None of 
us had ever seen anything like this species of jellyfish, L inuche 
unguiculata , which is without tentacles and has a scalloped margin. 
We learned, however, that it forms swarms miles in extent in 
the Bahama-Florida region in the spring. When the animals 
mature in April, they rise to the surface in immense numbers. 
The ripe female gonads are slate-colored or blue-gray perhaps , 
the male a yellowish brown. The eggs are discharged and fertilized 
in the sea about 8 p.m., after which the jellyfish sink to the 
bottom to die. The species goes through an alternation of genera- 
tions. The egg develops into a little sessile antlike organism 
from which the larval jellyfish are pinched off, or shed, by a 
process known as stabilization, to become free-swimming and to 
