26. [BALANUS] PATELLARIS. Pl. [6], fig. [5 a]-[5 c].
LEPAS PATELLARIS, (Gmelin). Spengler. Schriften der Berlin. Gesellschaft, &c. b. i (1780), Tab. 5; Chemnitz, Neues Syst. Couch., Tab. 98, fig. 839.
Shell depressed; brown, generally with obscure longitudinal violet stripes: radii (in full-grown specimens) with their summits rounded and surfaces finely ribbed parallel to the basis: basis sometimes permeated by imperfect pores. Scutum internally with an adductor ridge.
Hab.—Bengal, on wood, Mus. Brit.; on a shell, Mus. Stutchbury; Philippine Archipelago (young specimen), Mus. Cuming. According to Spengler, on the Coromandel and Malabar coasts.
General Appearance.—Shell depressed, sometimes much depressed: orifice elongated, rhomboidal, but little toothed; surface smooth, but in old specimens sometimes with the walls slightly folded longitudinally. The radii are rather narrow, with their summits oblique; in old specimens their summits are rounded, and their whole surface finely ribbed parallel to the basis. Colour, in old specimens dirty brown, tinged with violet, sometimes in longitudinal bands, and with whiter irregular marks in the upper parts owing to disintegration: in young specimens the walls are regularly banded longitudinally, with violet-brown and dirty white; the radii being generally of a paler dirty red or violet. Basal diameter of largest specimen .9 of an inch.
Scuta, externally rather smooth; internally, articular ridge prominent, reflexed, with the lower edge hollowed out so as to be slightly hook-formed: adductor ridge small; there is a slight pit for the lateral depressor. Tergum, with the spur bluntly pointed, placed at about its own width from the basi-scutal angle; there is no longitudinal furrow, only a slight depression; carinal margin arched and protuberant: internally, articular ridge extremely prominent, running down in the direction of the middle of the spur: crests for the tergal depressores well developed.
Parietes, with the pores rather large; the internal lamina is very strongly ribbed, the ribs being but slightly denticulated at their bases: the parietal pores do not appear to be crossed by transverse septa: sheath closely attached to the walls. The radii have jagged oblique summits forming an angle of about 45° with the horizon; in old specimens they become more oblique and narrow: and are then very remarkable from their summits being arched and rounded, with a crenated edge, and with their whole surface transversely ribbed in horizontal lines; this is likewise the case with the recipient furrow in the opposed compartments: in young specimens the radii are externally quite smooth: the septa on the sutural edges are bluntly denticulated; the interspaces being filled up solidly. The alæ have their summits oblique, but much less oblique than the summits of the radii; their sutural edges are very finely crenated.
Basis thin, either quite solid, that is, not permeated by pores, but only furrowed in lines radiating from the centre, or permeated by pores towards the circumference, the pores being of very small diameter;—so that we here have an important character variable within the limits of the same species. Base flat, and this holds good, as remarked by Spengler, even when the specimens are attached to cylindrical pieces of wood.
Animal’s body unknown.