their Food and Digestive Orga?is, 4-15 



vorous Vitrina (Helicolimax Lamarck?*? of Ferussac) differs 

 from our native species in some respects ; but, according to the 

 Rev. Mr. Lowe, to whom we owe our acquaintance with its 

 habits, " is so closely allied, that it would be very rash at 

 present to separate it " from the genus.* When leaves and 

 other vegetable matters were given to it, they were never 

 touched,^even although care was taken that the Vitrina should 

 have nothing else for nearly a fortnight; but, on the very first 

 night of its confinement, it would kill and eat a small snail, 

 and it preyed on its own species greedily, the larger slaying 

 the smaller, and then indulging its cannibal appetite. Two 

 of nearly equal size being put together, the stronger or braver 

 slew his neighbour, which furnished a plentiful repast for two 

 or three succeeding nights, for it is during this season only 

 that they feed. {Lowe, in Zool. Journ,, iv. .342.) It would 

 be well to ascertain whether our own Vitrinse are not equally 

 carnivorous and addicted to cannibalism : they are at present 

 believed to be herbivorous ; but Mr. Jeffreys informs us that 

 V. pellucida " has the same carnivorous propensities as the 

 smaller Ximacidae and Testacelli ; and I once," he adds, 

 " detected no less than seven individuals busily engaged in 

 feeding on a scarcely dead earthworm, which was faintly 

 writhing about, and endeavouring in vain to get rid of its 

 assailants." [Linn. Trans,, xvi. 506.) 



The Pteropodous MoUusca are probably zoophagous ; the 

 minute Crustacea and Medus<^, or particles of dead animal 

 matter floating in the sea, furnishing their nutriment. Some 

 species of this order abound amazingly in the Arctic Ocean, 

 where the marine vegetation seems too scanty for the requisite 

 supply of food; and, moreover, they are found floating far 

 from the shore, and at the surface, where no vegetables are. 

 We have, however, no certain information on this head. 



On the contrary, it is well ascertained that all the Cepha- 

 lopoda are carnivorous, and for voraciousness and ferocity 

 may justly claim precedence among molluscs. Such of them 

 as swim in the bosom of the ocean, as ioligo, feed upon fish 



and Fossil Shells.) Mr. J. D. C. Sowerby has, too, shown me, in a spe- 

 cimen preserved in spirits, that the tongue is furnished, around and just 

 beneath (if not upon) its margin, on the outside, with short hair-like 

 bristles, which doubtless increase its power of retaining secure hold. Mr, 

 Sowerby also showed me, in other specimens, that the inner face of the 

 stomach, or of the parts leading into it, is furrowed and roughened, in aid, 

 it may be presumed, of the slug's ingesting its prey. — J. D. 



* This opinion of Mr. Lowe's is confirmed by the anatomy of the 

 species, excellently developed by the Rev. M. J. Berkeley in Zool. Jour., 

 No. xix. p. 305. 



