238 Miscellaneous. 



N. bifrons by the same process. This last gemmation has been ob- 

 served by the author in all its phases. He saw two specimens of 

 N. splendidtti enveloped in a sort of mucosity, open and evacuate 

 the whole of their contents, which served to form a N. hifrons. The 

 production of the reproductive bodies by the latter was also observed ; 

 but their development into Surirella microcora and the production 

 oi N. splendida by conjugation rests entirely on the inductions of 

 the author. 



These facts require revision and confirmation, but they are still 

 worthy of the attention of observers, and appear to point to phsenomena 

 quite as singular as those which have been revealed to us within the 

 last few years by the study of the reproduction of so many of the 

 lower animals. They in fact present in a manner the converse of the 

 pheenomena exhibited in the ordinary alternation of generations, as 

 several germs or eggs are necessary for the production of the last 

 individual of the cycle. — Comptes Bendus, Jan. 22, 1855, p. 167. 



On Lottia zebrina and L. Scurra. By Dr. J. E. Gray. 



In the Philosophical Transactions for 1833, I referred these com- 

 mon Peruvian Mollusca to the genus Lottia^ If I recollect rightly/ ;^ 

 ( M. D'O rbigny, in his * Voya ge to South^ 4sag^^(£p"^^~^^ exami- / 

 nation oFsome animals of these shells in Paris/j5gures these animals, 

 and refers them to the genus Patella ; and putting faith in the 

 accuracy of this determination^in the Catalogue of M. D'Orbigny's 

 collection, which has lately been transferred to the British Museum, 

 I observed, " These are Patellce, and not Lottice.** In the Mollusca 

 collected by M. Souleyet during the voyage of the ' Bonite,* which 

 have lately been acquired by the Museum, there are several speci- 

 mens of this shell, belonging to two of the varieties of it which M. 

 D'Orbigny has regarded as distinct species, and, on examination of 

 the animals, they prove to be Lotties, and not Patellce ; — peculiar, like 

 Lottia Scurra, for having a series of rather large beards round the 

 inner edge of the mantle ; and I suppose M. D'Orbigny must have 

 mistaken these beards for the gills, and thus made the mistake which 

 I am now desirous of rectifying. The gill of Lottia zebrina, and of 

 several other species without or with only very rudimentary beards on 

 the mantle-edge, as L. 'punctata, is free and floating in the nuchal 

 mantle-cavity for the greater part of its length, while the gill of L, 

 Scurra, the type of the proposed genus Scurria, is attached by its 

 outer or left edge to the inner surface of the mantle, which induced 

 me, with its peculiar habits, to regard it as a genus distinct from 

 Lottia. 



Description of a new species of Sorex, frotn India. 

 By R. Templeton. 



SOREX? PURPURASCENS, n. Sp. 



Dark slate-coloured, with a tinge of purple ; snout beneath and 

 lower lip brownish, with a mesial groove above, running back half 

 the distance to the eyes j front covered with black hairs having white 



