Habitat.—Indian Ocean, Madagascar (Rabbe), surface.
2. Theophæna nonaria, n. sp.
Shell thorny, ovate, with two slight strictures. Length of the three joints = 1 : 4 : 5, breadth = 1 : 5 : 4. Cephalis subspherical, with a conical horn of half the length. Thorax subspherical, with regular, circular pores and conical spines. Abdomen ovate, smooth, with irregular, roundish pores. In the upper half of the thorax descend nine straight, little divergent ribs, which in the lower half become free, and represent nine slender, conical wings; their distal ends do not reach the horizontal plane in which the basal end of the abdomen lies.
Dimensions.—Length of the three joints, a 0.03, b 0.12, c 0.15; breadth, a 0.03, b 0.14, c 0.12.
Habitat.—South of Australia, Station 160, surface.
Family LXVII. Theocyrtida, n. fam.
Theocorida et Theocapsida, Haeckel, 1881, Prodromus, pp. 434, 436.
Definition.—Tricyrtida eradiata. Cyrtoidea with a three-jointed shell, divided by two transverse constrictions into cephalis, thorax, and abdomen, without radial apophyses.
The family Theocyrtida, composed of the Theocorida and Theocapsida of my Prodromus, comprises those Cyrtoidea in which the lattice-shell is three-jointed, and bears no external radial apophyses. The two subfamilies differ in the shape of the terminal mouth, which in the Theocorida is a simple wide opening, in the Theocapsida closed by a lattice-plate. The phylogenetic origin of the Theocyrtida may be found either in the Podocyrtida or in the Sethocyrtida; they may have been derived from the former by reduction and loss of the three primary apophyses, or from the latter by development of an abdomen.
The number of species in this group is very large, and many belong to the most common and widely distributed Cyrtoidea. A great number of living and fossil species have already been described by Ehrenberg, the majority being disposed in his genera Lithocampe and Eucyrtidium.