138 THE NAUTILUS. 



he had struck a remarkably rich region. Then a " Syndicate " 

 was formed of T. H. Aldrich, of Washington, D. C., Mr. 

 Bryant Walker, of Detroit, Dr. H. A. Pilsbry, of the Academy 

 of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, Pa., and the writer, and the 

 work was carried on steadily for over six years. Dr. Pilsbry 

 dropped out in 1906, and he was replaced by Mr. John B. 

 Henderson, of Washington, D. C. 



The naming and distribution of the thousands of land shells 

 collected in all parts of Alabama, fell to the part of the writer, 

 and the new species have all been described by him; 13 species 

 and 4 varieties up-to-date, with probably several more to follow, 

 as the material is more carefully studied. After the regular 

 work for the "Syndicate" was stopped, Mr. Smith continued 

 collecting fresh-water shells for Mr. Walker, and land shells for 

 the writer, while collecting Tertiary fossils for the Geological 

 Survey of Alabama, by which he was employed as Curator of 

 the Museum at the University of Alabama. The sorting, 

 naming and distributing of the fresh- water shells, was done by 

 Mr. Walker, and I cannot do better than quote from a letter 

 from him, on this subject: 



" I enclose the meager list of n. sp. and vars. that have been 

 described from Mr. Smith's material. But that does not begin 

 to show the enormous amount of work that he did in develop- 

 ing the fauna of Alabama. Besides going the whole length of 

 the Coosa from Gadsden to Wetumpka by boat, he did the 

 Black Warrior thoroughly before it was spoiled by the Govern- 

 ment improvements (?) and spent a season on the Mussel Shoals 

 of the Tennessee. Two or three summers were spent on the 

 Connasauga and other head-waters of the Coosa, and in numer- 

 ous side trips he had covered practically the whole state. 

 Then, too, through local collectors, many of them trained by 

 him, he had reached into many localities that he did not per- 

 sonally visit. By these means he collected an enormous 

 amount of material, practically none of which has been worked 

 up. 



' While he worked for the ' Syndicate ' he collected every- 

 thing; but when that arrangement ceased, he specialized in the 

 Unionidse and Pleurocerida. I have not any very accurate fig- 

 ures on the number of specimens of Unionidse. that he collected, 

 but I think that from 40,000 to 50,000 would not be an over- 

 estimate. His Black Warrior collection alone he reported as 

 10,000. No report on this material has ever been made, and a 



