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Show 1905.J SPONGE CLATHRINA CONTORTA. 17 From the foregoing it will be seen, I think, that the name-question, in the case of the species under consideration, is a tangled problem, one, indeed, which I feel some diffidence in approaching. I could wish, in fact, as I have said elsewhere, that there were in existence some sort of International Hague Tribunal to which these knotty points of nomenclature could lie referred for arbitration and authoritative settlement. In the absence, however, of any such body, I extract from the facts above set forth the following conclusions:- (1) Bow'erbank's Leucosolenia contorta was a jumble of different species, and his description could not be used for identification of any particular species. Hence Leucosolenia contorta Bowerbank is a nomen nudum, of no systematic validity. (2) Haeckel's Ascandra contorta, though not in all respects correctly described, can be applied to an existing species of Ascon, which can be identified by his description. This I consider the true contorta: ought the species, however, to be written contorta Bwk. or contorta H. ? Pending the constitution of the International Nomenclature Tribunal, in order to settle this important point, I content myself in following Haeckel in calling it contorta Bwk. (3) Ascetta spinosa Lend, is probably the young form, without monaxons, of contorta. I arrive therefore at the following synonymy and diagnosis:- Clathrina contorta (Bowerbank). ? Nardoa spongiosa Kolliker *, 1864, leones Histologicse, Abth. i. pp. 63, 64, pi. vii. fig. 10, pi. ix. figg. 6-8. Leucosolenia contorta Bowerbank 1866, Mon. Brit. Spong. ii. pp. 29-32 ; 1874, op. cit. iii. pp. 7-8, pi. iii. figg. 5-10. Leucosolenia {Nardoa) contorta Gray, 1867, P. Z. S. p. 555. Leucosolenia (Leuciria) contorta Haeckel, 1870, Jen. Zeitschr. v. p. 243. Ascandra contorta Haeckel, 1872, Kalkschwamme, ii. pp. 91- 93, iii. pi. 14. figg. 6 a -6 e. ? Ascaltis contorta Hanitsch, 1890, Tr. Biol. Soc. L'pool, iv. pp. 195 & 233. Ascetta spinosa Lendenfeld, 1891, Zeitschr. wiss. Zool. liii. pp. 203-205, pi. viii. figg. 2, 16, 21, 22. Leucosolenia contorta Topsent, 1891, Arch. Zool. Exp. (2) ix. p. 525 ; Bull. Soc. Zool. France, xvi. p. 128 ; 1892, Result. Cam-pagnes Sci. Albert l er, fasc. ii. p. 22 ; 1894, Rev. Biol. Nord France, vii. pp. 7 & 22. Clathrina contorta Minchin, 1896, Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. (6) xviii. p. 359. * Nardoa spongiosa Kolliker lias been put by Haeckel as a synonym of either Ascaltis cerebrum or A. gegenbauri, but the figures of the external form, no less than those of the spiculation, given by Kolliker, seem to me to indicate that the author was dealing with the spinosa-iorm of contorta. I have discussed this point elsewhere (Quart. Journ. Micr. Sci. n. s. xl. p. 533, footnote). P roc. Z ool. Soc.-1905, V ol. II. No. II. 2 |
