abrupt anterior outline making but a short prow. The importance of the form
And of the functions of hooks are well illustrated in this species, which has no less
than three kinds.
The branchiae arise from the second and third segments by short and somewhat
bulky and fluted stems, which are flattened antero-posteriorly. The two main divisions
Are dorsal, each having a smooth basal process directed backward and a fusiform dorsal
region composed of lamellae, which from the stem backward abut on the smooth basal
process, whilst the lamellae of the portions in front of the stem are fixed to a median
ventral band. These lamellae are highly vascular, the vessels or channels forming a close
series of arches from twelve to eighteen in number along each leaflet, the free margin of
which is crenate. The posterior branchiae are much smaller, but they also have a basal
trunk to which the lamellae are attached. The lamellae are more or less conical, having a
distinct apex to which the vascular channels point, and thus they are more or less straight
And nearly vertical. A coagulated fusiform mass occurred in the basal trunk of one. In
the tube the branchiae are turned forward with the basal region of . the smaller pair uppermost,
and the lamellae next the dorsum.
Reproduction.—Willemoes-Suhm1 (1871) describes the eggs of this form attached to
sea-grass in May, at Kiel, and followed its development up -to the late trochophore stage
with two large red eyes and a long tuft of cilia in front, besides prototroch and telotroch,
Leschke1 2 also refers to the same species at Kiel. Lo Bianco (1909) found at Naples
both males and females in full sexual maturity from May to November.
Tube.—Small examples occurred in rather friable tubes of soft grey mud and sand
{“ Porcupine,” 1869, 422 fathoms). Larger forms from Norway have thick tubes of dark
grey mud. In the Canadian examples the friable tube consists of brownish sand. The
internal secretion is scanty.
Habits.—It generally frequents a muddy bottom, as for instance in 18 fathoms
^towards the southern end of Bressay Sound. It can wriggle about when disturbed, and
rolls along the vessel in captivity, boring its snout into a muddy mass and completely
hiding itself, the great branchial. lobes apparently offering no obstacle. It readily
leaves its tube, and as that is of friable mud and sand it frequently disappears in
the dredge. The body is generally more or less .coiled. The dorsal blood-vessel is
large, and waves of contraction drive the contents forward, a dilatation occurring
just behind the tips of the branchiae. The contractions take place about thirty-six times
per minute.
This was one of the many new species of marine animals which the elder Sars, then
a clergyman at “ Floröe Praestegaard,” added to science in his remarkable * Beskrivelser og
Iagttagelser/ published when he was sixty miles from the nearest zoological library. It
was but an earnest of a life of zoological discovery which no surroundings could alter
and no vicissitudes could quench; moreover, his skill in pourtraying the forma which came
under his notice kept pace with the ardour and accuracy of his observations.
Fritz Müller3 seems to have found a similar form off the Coast of Brazil.
1 ‘Zeitschr. f. w. Zool./ Bd. xxi, p. 391, Taf. xxxii.
2 ‘ Wiss. Meeresuntersuch./ Bd. v, p. 128.
8 ‘Archiv f. Nat urges./ Bd. xxxiv, p. 218, 1858.
Steen1 (1883), in his account of the structure of the species, designates the thoracic
glands as salivary glands. The segmental organs are situated in the fifth and sixth
segments, a pair in each, and the funnel opens into the body-cavity in the middle of the
segment, projecting, not through a diaphragm, but according to his interpretation.,,
standing at right angles to the body-wall.
Parasites.—Levinsen2 describes a crustacean parasite (Saccopsis terebellidis) of this-
species from Greenland, the body of the female of which is somewhat pear-shaped and
without apparent segmentation. Behind the eighth bristle tuft on the right a reddish-
brown mass with processes passing internally occurred in a large example from Berehaven,.
Ireland. It is probably one of the Rhizocephala.
M. Sars* (1861) described a parasitic female Copepod which he termed Terebellicola
reptans in this species. The body is pear-shaped, the broad end being in front, with
eleven segments. The head is joined to the first thoracic segment, and has a rostrum.
Maxillipedes and five pairs of feet are present, the fifth, however, being rudimentary
(biarticulate).
Wiren (1886) gives an account of a Lumbrinereid commensal, Heeniatocleptes terebellidis,
living in the oesophagus of this species.
Cunningham and Ramage (1888) mention that there is but one pair of nephridia in
the first bristled segment.
The sub-family Canephoridea of Malmgren contains Grube’s genus Ganephorus,
which seems to be closely allied to Terebellides, having twenty anterior segments and
thirty-two posterior. Branchiae sinuous quadrilobate (arising from segment 2), and on a,
short basal process. Colour greyish, a little iridescent.
Family XXX.—Sabellidas.
The body is somewhat rounded or slightly flattened, of two regions, an anterior
(often called the thoracic) embracing from five to twelve segments with bristles of two
kinds, and hooks of two kinds in a double row, either long or short, and a posterior
(so-called abdominal) region of numerous segments. The ventral longitudinal sulcus is
continued on the dorsum anteriorly. The bristles and hooks of the posterior region are
each of one type.
The first segment has a collar more or less adpressed to the branchiae. Branchiae
forming a funnel surrounding the mouth by the apposition of the fan on each side, the
rays having only pinnae internally in Sabellids proper, and externally occasionally
processes arranged in pairs, and eyes in other forms. A pair of muciparous glands
(modified segmental organs) opening by a single orifice anteriorly. Posteriorly
1 ‘ Jenaisclie Zeitschr. f. Nat./ Bd. xvi, p. 232, Taf. xi—xiii.
2 ‘ Videnskab. Meddel. Naturliist. For. Kj^benhavn/ p. 24, Tab. vi, figs. 21—22, 1877.
8 ‘ Forhandl. Vid.-selsk. Christ./ 1861, p. 189.