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

—ALCTONARIA. 35127. Solanderia, ? sp.An apparently dead and bleached specimen of considerable sizeseems to belong to this gonns, and is decidedly distinct from theSouth-African species called by Gray Homophyton (jatti/ce ; but Iprefer to await better specimens before describing it, as members ofthis family appear to rapidly lose their natural characters whendying in the sea.Ilab. Thursday Island, Torres Straits, 4-5 fms.ICILIGORGIA.Drichassainq de Fo)ihressin, Revue des Zoophytes et des Spongiaires dcsAntilles (Paris, 1870), p. 13.Central spicular axis dense, imperforate. Longitudinal canalsforming a circumaxial zone. Erect, branched ; stem and branchesantero-laterally compressed, with knife-like lateral edges. Zooidswholly retractile, arranged in single series along each edge of thebranches ; no external verruca?.To this hitherto exclusively AYest-Indian genus appears to belongthe following species :28. Iciligorgia orientalis. (Plate XXXYII. figs. F-F",and Plate XXXVIII. fig. e.)Stem long, slender, transverselj" expanded, with a median roundedridge running down each of the anterior and posterior faces ; thelateral margins forming two even knife-like edges, in grooves inv.'hich the zooids lie. Branching ai:)parently normally dichotomous,in same plaiie as the long diameter of the stem. Branches oval, transverselyexpanded, like the stem, but without the median roundedridge possessed by the stem, except near the origins of the mainbranches. The transverse diameter of both stem and branches is tothe antero-posterior as 2 : 1. Surface even, feeling shghtly rough tothe finger. Zooids uniserially arranged, about -5 millim. in diameter,"5 millim. apart, set in a narrow continuous lateral groove ofthe stem and branches. Colour of stem in spirit pinkish yellow, ofbranches cream-colour.In transverse section the stem and branches are seen to consist ofa cylindrical central (" medullary ") spicular axis of closely aggregatedbut distinct spicula, occupying from four fifths (at the base ofthe stem) to one half (at the apex of the branches) of the entirethickness. The cortical layer is similarly constituted ; it is separatedfrom the medulla by a single annular series of four to sixcircular or oval longitudinal canals, varying in diameter from about•15 millim. near the terminations of the branches to -3 millim. atthe base of the stem. Spicules of medulla, chief forms :—(i.) Roughlyfusiform, with fewirregularly scattered, mostly fungiform, compoundtubercles : size about -28 to -45 by -087 millim., the largest tuberclesabout -024 millim. in height, (ii.) Elongated, cylindrical, rounded