THE NAUTILUS. 



VOL. XX. NOVEMBER, 1906. No. 7. 



ON THE DISTRIBUTION OF HELIX HORTEN8IS MUELLER, IN NORTH 



AMERICA. 



BY CHARLES W. JOHNSON. 



The object of this paper is to record in full our present knowledge 

 of tlie distribution of this species in North America, and to bring to- 

 gether the scattered literature bearing on the subject. 



This species which presents such an interesting problem in geo- 

 graphical distribution was first recorded from North America in 

 1829 by a Mrs. Sheppard, of Woodfield, in an article " On the recent 

 shells which characterize Quebec and its environs." In this she 

 states that Helix hortensis is " found on the bank near the plain of 

 Abraham, common in the spring." In 1837 2 Amos Binney de- 

 scribed the "olivaceous yellow," non-banded variety as Helix sub- 

 globosa, stating that it " is common on the lower parts of Cape Cod 

 and Cape Ann, and is very abundant on Salt Island, a rocky unin- 

 habited island near Gloucester." This seems to be the first New 

 England record, for it is not mentioned by either John M. Earle or 

 Col. Jos. G. Totten in their lists of Massachusetts and New England 

 shells in 1833. 3 



Dr. A. A. Gould in 1841,* under Helix hortensis, adds to the 



1 Transactions of the Literary and Historical Society of Quebec, I, p. 193' 

 1829. 



J Boston Journal of Natural History, I, p. 488, pi. 17, 1837. 



1 Hitchcock's Kept, on the Geology, etc., Mass., pp. 557, 559, 1833. 



*Report on the Invertebrata of Massachusetts, p. 172, 1841. 



