152 THE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 



September S, 1874. Cape York (Australia), off Albany Island. 3 to 12 fathoms. 



Shell. — Thinnish, pale rufous, globose, with a short scalar spire, spinous whorls, a 

 minute, regular, conically globose, glossy chestnut apex, an oval mouth, a denticulated 

 and, on the edge, slightly crenulated outer lip, a short rounded base, and a long straightish 

 snout. Sculpture : Longitudinals — there are three strorigish corresponding varices on each 

 whorl ; they are marked by short, stout, diverging, front-furrowed spines, whose numbers 

 are probably incomplete (as the specimens are young), but are evidently few ; these 

 spinous varices run straight down the snout ; between the varices are two tubercled ribs ; 

 the first 2-| regular whorls present no distinction between these varices and ribs, but are 

 crossed by about 10 tubercled ribs, on each of which above is a single, short, hollow spine ; 

 besides these are many faint, very slightly raised, rounded threads. Spirals — there are 

 on the last whorl about 20 narrow, rather raised, rounded, distant threads ; others similar 

 appear on the snout, but become obsolete in front, the latter third being glossy and smooth ; 

 the upper whorls are bisected by an angular keel, besides which, on the last whorl, there 

 is a blunter keel where the basal contraction begins : both of these keels are accentuated 

 by the tubercles into which they rise in crossing the longitudinal ribs and the spines on 

 the varices. Colour dead white with a rufous tinge, which is stronger on the spire, on 

 two faint bands corresponding with the keels, on the spines, and on the glossy point of 

 the snout, where are some rich chestnut stains; the apex is also chestnut. Spire low, 

 conical, scalar. Apex consists of three conically globose, rounded, glossy, chestnut whorls, 

 of which the extreme tip is minute, rounded, and a little bent down and inserted ; they 

 terminate abruptly in a patulous and slightly prominent mouth-edge, which is regularly 

 curved, has no sinus, but has a concave edge. Whorls 8 ; but the shell is not full-grown ; 

 the upper ones are angulately carinated in the middle, with a sloping shoulder between 

 the suture and the keel ; they are all slightly rounded, with a very faint contraction into 

 the suture; the last is tumid, angularly rounded, with a very contracted convex base 

 produced into a very long snout. Suture angulated and slightly constricted. Mouth oval, 

 rounded above, pointed below, where it runs into the long, nearly closed, linear, straight 

 canal. Outer lip semicircular ; its edge, which projects markedly in front of the labral 

 varix, is somewhat cut up by slashes continuous with the furrows of the spines ; a basal 

 tooth is somewhat prominent ; internally the lip is feebly toothed. Inner lip spreads 

 thinly and narrowly on the base, and advances straight down the pillar as a reflexed 

 lamina, which is abruptly turned over to the right to cover the canal, leaving behind it a 

 chink above and a long straight furrow below. H. 1'8 in. B. 0"6. Penultimate whorl, 

 height 0-13. Mouth, height 1'5 (excluding the canal 0-38), breadth 0*27. 



This species is very like Murex macgillivrayi, Dohrn, but is certainly distinct. Like that 

 species it has two intervarical ribs ; the texture of the shell, too, and the short spines are similar ; 

 but the spiral threads are different, the spire is bigger, broader, and shorter, and that species has 



