A Monograph on the Sub-class Cirripedia (Volume 2 of 2): The Balanidæ, (or Sessile Cirripedes); the Verrucidæ, etc., etc.Darwin, Charles
Science
A Monograph on the Sub-class Cirripedia (Volume 2 of 2): The Balanidæ, (or Sessile Cirripedes); the Verrucidæ, etc., etc.
Darwin, Charles
Balanidae; Cirripedia
The above-mentioned muscles are attached at their upper ends to the
opercular valves, and at their lower ends to the basis. There are, in
fact, three pairs, but the pair attached to the basi-carinal angles of
the two terga (Pl. 25, fig. 1, _i_), are almost invariably confluent,
forming one great bundle; the second pair is attached to the lateral
or basi-tergal corners of the two scuta, and are hidden in the figure;
the third pair (_h_) is attached also to the scuta, to their rostral
angles. These muscles can only act as depressores; they are often
extremely powerful; they belong to the voluntary class, for they
are transversely striped. By their action, the opercular valves are
capable of varied slight movements, within the limit allowed by the
width of the flexible opercular membrane. By the action of the lateral
scutal depressores, the orifice leading into the sack is opened, the
movement being generally aided by the protrusion of the cirri. By the
sudden contraction of the rostral scutal depressores, the blows which
are sometimes given by the beaked terga at the opposite end of the
operculum, are probably effected. By the contraction of all three pairs
of muscles, the opercular valves are held down with quite surprising
force. The valves can be raised only by the action of the animal's body
against the basis.
In Coronula these muscles are more spread out, and do not extend
down to the basis; their lower portions, as is likewise the case in
Tubicinella, do not exhibit transverse striæ, and hence tend to pass
either into the involuntary class, or into ligament. This condition of
the muscles, in the above two genera, accords with the little-developed
state of their opercular valves. In Xenobalanus, there is no longer
any evidence of the muscles being collected into five or six bundles,
for they are thinly and almost uniformly spread out, and show in no
part transverse striæ. I may add that in much elongated specimens
of _Balanus balanoides_, these muscles become in their lower part
ligamentous, and destitute of striæ.
_Branchiæ._
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