Report on the zoological collections made in the Indo-Pacific Ocean ...

326 COLLECTIONS FROM MELANESIA.distal extremity of its fourth and fifth joints five protuberances,of which the two outerinost are small, and the three inner longer, strongand subacute ; near the middle of the ventral surface of the fourthjoint is a small process (as in F. Jluminense), and a series of minutespinules or protuberances along the upper margin of the fifth joint;the joints also, except perhaps the eighth, are marked with longitudinalimpressed lines ; the eighth has a series of spinules on itsinferior surface ; besides the terminal claw there are, as alreadynoted, two strong accessory claws. The first to third joints of thelegs are scantily clothed with very short hair ; the distal protuberancesof the fourth joint and the fifth joints are more thicklyclothed with longer hair, and the sixth to eighth joints again with amuch finer, more scanty pubescence.Three specimens are in the collection, obtained respectively atDuudas Straits, 17 fms. (No. 161), Thursday Island, 4-5 fms. (Xo.165), and in Prince of Wales Channel, 7 fms. (IN'o. 169). As inthese specimens the thigh-joints are not specially dilated and thegeiiital pores are small, I believe them to be males.Tliis species resembles Phoxichilklium insir/ne, Hoek (t. c. p. 82,5-7), from Bahia, in the curious distal protuberances ofpi. xiv. figs.the fourth and fifth joints of the legs, but these are absent fromthe second and third joints in P. hoekii, and our species differs inmany other most important points, as(e.g.) in the closely approximatedleg-bearing processes of the body, the terminally-placed secondjoints of the mandibles, and the more robust body and appendages.The first-mentioned of these characters will also separatethis species from P. Jluminense, Kroyer (see Hock, t. c. p. 81,pi. xiv. figs. 1-4), from which it is also distinguished by thedistal protuberances of the leg-joints &c. The existence of theseprotuberances separates this species from those other species ofPlioxicliUidiimi described by Dr. Hoek in which the leg-bearingprocesses are more or less approximated, and from the two Australspecies described by White* as Nymphon pJiasma and N.johnstonianum,which Dr. Hoek has shown belong to Phoxichilidmm. The"points" mentioned by White as occurring at the end of the ointsin N. johnstonianum are, I may add, only short stiff sefce.* Proc. Zool. Soc. XV. p. 125 (1847).