MR. H. N. MOSELEY ON THE STRUCTURE OF THE STYLASTERIDSE. 
Distribution in Space and Time of the Stylasterida;. 
The Stylasteridse range all over the world, and exist at all depths from shallow 
water on the coasts to great depths in the open oceans. Two species occur close at 
home off the coast of Norway, viz., Allopora oculina, obtained by G. 0. Sars in from 
50 to 100 fathoms, and Stylaster gemmascens, which occurs at great depths in the 
Foldenfjord. The same species, originally described from the Indian Ocean, occurs in 
the North Atlantic in 530 fathoms. Stylaster roseus is abundant in a depth of two feet 
below low water mark on the coast of Cuba,""' and Stylaster punctatus occurs in nine 
fathoms off Florida.! Stylaster sanguineus occurs at Florida and New Zealand, and I 
dredged a closely allied, if not the same, species in two fathoms on the Philippine coast. 
Cryptohelia came originally from New Guinea. It was dredged by the ‘ Challenger’ 
in all parts of the world, and up to a depth of 1,530 fathoms. Some genera, as 
Sporadopora and Spinipora, are as yet known only from one locality, but no doubt 
their range will be extended by further dredging. 
No Stylasteridse are known from geological deposits older than the tertiary; indeed, 
until now a single species only of one genus, Distichopora, has been described as occur- 
ring in the fossil condition, viz., Distichopora antiqua from tertiary beds at Chaumont, 
in France. Fossil Stylasteridse have, however, been confounded with Bryozoa, just as 
Gray confounded the recent Labiopora with Porella. Two species of a genus termed 
Dendracis, figured by Fr. A. PuiMER,| which occur in the Oligocoene of Lattorf, are 
evidently Stylasterids, and probably members of the genus Allopora, in which they 
have been introduced in the present paper in the list of species, as Allopora tuberculosa 
and pygmcea. Some calcareous structures from the Cenoman ( = middle chalk) figured 
by the Putter von Reuss, in the same publication as that containing Romer’s paper, § 
and placed with Heteroporella as Bryozoa, may very possibly prove allied to Pliobothrus 
on further examination. Tkalamipora, || figured by the same author in the same paper, 
seems to be a Stylasterid bearing large female ampullae, present in abundance and 
agglomerated, the pore systems being all at the ends of the branches, whilst a deep 
central gastropore in each system is surrounded by a circlet of from five to seven 
dactylopores. Yon Reuss is in great doubt as to the affinities of this form, but 
concludes that it is a chambered foraminifer. It is probable that now that their 
importance and structure is more fully known, abundance of fossil Stylasterida will be 
made out. The structure of the Stylasteridse appears to throw no light upon that of 
the Graptolites. 
Exeter College, Oxford, January 2,1st, 1878. 
* Pourtales’ ‘ Deep Sea Corals,’ p. 83. 
f Pourtales, l.c., p. 36. 
X Fr. A. Romer. ‘ Bescbreibung der Norddeutschen tertiaren Polyparien.’ Meter’s ‘ Palseonto- 
grapbica,’ bd. ix., p. 243, taf. xxxix., fig. 15, a, b, c. 
§ Ritter von Reuss. Die Bryozoen des unteren Planer’s ‘ Palseontograpbica,’ bd. xx., taf. xxxiii. 
|| Ibid., p. 138. 
