. Descriptions of some new and rare Cephalopoda. Cephalopoda. 166 PEOF. OWEN ON NEW AND EARE CEPHALOPODA. In the account given by the government diver of the colony of Victoria, Australia, in his Report, as cited in the weekly journal entitled ' The Colonies and India '\ it appears that, pursuing his avocation in the estuary of the river Moyne, and having occasion to explore a hole in the bed, " his arm was seized by the tentacles of an Octopus, part of which he brought to shore, after mutilating his assailant with strokes of ' a small iron bar.'" This part, probably consisting of th
. Descriptions of some new and rare Cephalopoda. Cephalopoda. 166 PEOF. OWEN ON NEW AND EARE CEPHALOPODA. In the account given by the government diver of the colony of Victoria, Australia, in his Report, as cited in the weekly journal entitled ' The Colonies and India '\ it appears that, pursuing his avocation in the estuary of the river Moyne, and having occasion to explore a hole in the bed, " his arm was seized by the tentacles of an Octopus, part of which he brought to shore, after mutilating his assailant with strokes of ' a small iron bar.'" This part, probably consisting of the head with more or less of the crown and arms, " being laid out, measured over 8 feet ; We may assume this measurement to have been taken from the tip of one out- stretched cephalic arm to that of the opposite arm. Now the length of the longest arm of my Australian Tritaxeopus (Plate XXIII. fig. 1) is 1 foot 11 inches ; the breadth of the head intervening between the third pair of arms is 2 inches 2 lines; so, from the tip of one of such arms to the opposite one gives 4 feet. If the Victorian diver took his measurements from tip to tip of the corresponding pair of acetabuliferous arms, and we deduct the breadth of the intervening part of the head according to the scale of Tritaxeojms, the length of such outstretched arm of the Moyne-river Octopod may be set down as 3 feet 10 inches; and the extent of the pair, with the intervening head reckoned at 4 inches 4 lines in breadth, would give 8 feet 2 inches, closely agreeing with the diver's statement. Stretching out the first dorsal pair of arms in a line with the body, the total length of Tritaxeojnis cornutus is 1 foot 6 inches ; allowing the like proportion to the dorsal arm of the Moyne-river Octopod, its total length may be set down as 3 feet. The ascertained differences in the proportions of arms, head, and body in the known species of Octopods do not, as a rule, support an inference of any notable error in
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Keywords: ., bookauthorowenrich, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, bookyear1881
