66 THE NAUTILUS. 



mals, for some reason, are of rare occurrence on my grounds ; neither 

 my own nor those of my immediate neighbors containing any. About 

 the middle of last August, I made my regular examination of certain 

 bricks, bats and pieces of wood, that have been turned over for the 

 hundredth time, with the usual experience in the way of slugs, but 

 had my reward by finding, to my great surprise, a large number, 

 over a hundred, of Vallonia pulchella. This species has not before 

 been reported as occurring in Los Angeles or elsewhere in this re- 

 gion. Many species and some varieties of the general Vallonia form 

 have been made by Dr. Sterki and others, based on the American 

 aspects of this genus. Dr. Pilsbry, referring to the examples sent to 

 him from my premises, says it is our " old friend pure and simple," 

 and further remarks that " Curiously we did not find it in the Great 

 Smokies, but Ashmun gets some costate forms (not pulchella) in 

 Arizona and New Mexico." Raymond obtained one specimen ot the 

 var. costata in Bloody Canyon, east side of Mono Pass, at an altitude 

 of about 8000 feet, in 1889. Mr. R. C. McGregor, 1 collected V- 

 pulchella *' in a yard at base of rose bushes," at Redding, in Shasta 

 county. 



In Dr. Cooper's catalogue of West North American shells, he 

 gives the distribution as " circumboreal," south to Mono county, Cal., 

 and subsequently, " Donner Lake, and near Truckee," in the Cali- 

 fornia Sierras. Mr. Button informs me that he found it plentiful 

 some years ago in Mountain View Cemetery, near Oakland ; that 

 specimens from that locality " ai m e light-colored, living on white mar- 

 ble copings." Mr. Hemphill states that he has "found V- pulcliella 

 at Julian City, San Diego Co., and at several other places in Cali- 

 fornia, Oregon and Washington." The late A. W. Crawford, ac- 

 cording to Mr. Raymond, collected it at " San Jose," in Santa Clara 

 county. 



It will be seen by the above that this pretty little snail is quite 

 widely dispersed in California, as well as elsewhere in the Pacific 

 States. In Pilsbry and Johnson's list 2 of American Land Shells, 

 etc., it is credited to " Montana eastward, from Canada to, or nearly 

 to, the Gulf of Mexico. Europe." 



1 See NAUTILUS, XII, Sept., 1898, p. 60, and Mrs. Williamson in same for 

 Oct., 1898, pp. 71-2. 



2 Philadelphia, April, 1889, p. 7. 



