CAULIFLOWER ALCYONIUM. 
Specific Character. 
Yellow-purple ALCYONIUM ? (Sponge?) with 
thick, flupofe hem, ramifying on the upper 
part ; with very thickly-crowded branchets. 
This elegant and lingular Alcyonium feems a 
fpecies hitherto undefcribed, and is a native of the 
coafts of New Holland, and more particularly of 
Norfolk Ifland ; adhering to rocks at a confide- 
rable depth. The plate reprefents it in its natural 
fize. The color of the Item and principal branches 
is pale yellow : of the fmaller ramifications bright 
crimfon or purple. The fubftance of the whole is 
foftifh, but tough ; harfh to the touch in its dried 
ftate; and feemingly compofed entirely of fmall, 
thickifh, vermicular fibres with attenuated or ftiar- 
pened extremities. The terminal clufters confift of 
divided and fubdivided tubular proccffes, each 
ending in a calycular, flightly-expanded part, not ill 
refembling a bracftea, and forming a kind of guard 
for what appears to be the animal part of the zoo¬ 
phyte ; viz. a kind of flower-Ihaped organ of a pale- 
yellow color, and compofed of the fame kind of 
thickifh vermicular fibres with the reft, but on a 
fmaller fcale, and fomewhat more clofely difpofed. 
This 
