230 Bulletin Vanderbilt Marine Museum, Vol. VII 



native country. Unfortunately, when the Jesuits were expelled 

 from the Spanish Territories, the Abbe Don Molina shared the 

 common fate and was also deprived of his natural history collec- 

 tions and his manuscripts. Some of the more important of the 

 latter relating to Chile, he recovered quite accidentally after he 

 established himself in Bologna, Italy. Here, in 1776, he published 

 an anonymous compendium of the History of Chile and in 1782 

 his "Saggio sulla Storia Maturate del Chile" was published, in 

 part, by the Stamperia d. S. Tomaso d. Aquino, Bologna. 



The present writer has not been able to trace the depository 

 of his types, if still extant. Their locality is here recorded simply 

 as Chile, reference to the Abbe Don Molina's manuscripts, depos- 

 ited in Bologna, Italy, being impractical. His brief description 

 of the "Cancer coronatus," is given on p. 170, vol. I, "The History 

 of Chile," English translation, 1809, under: 



Crustaceous Fishes and Insects: "The crowned crab {Cancer 

 coronatus) is furnished with a shell nearly oval, of about four 

 inches and a half in diameter, with an excrescence in the center 

 representing a mural crown.'" Though without an illustration, 

 the Molina description of the delineation of the profile of a crown 

 on the nearly oval carapace is entirely sufficient to identify the 

 species, so well known from the long stretch of South American 

 coast, from southernmost Chile, Port Otway, Valparaiso, Talca- 

 huano, and Lota to Callao, Peru, and the name Cancer coronatus 

 Molina should be given precedence over the more usually used 

 Cancer plebeiu^ Poeppig, whose type, taken on the muddy shores 

 of Chile, is deposited in the Zoological Museum at Leipzig. 



Distribution : Littoral zone of the coast of Chile, northward 

 to Callao, Peru, and probably to the Bay of Panama. 



Material examined: One male, collected at Ascension 

 Island, Chile. 



Colour : Not recorded from living specimens. There is noth- 

 ing in his text to indicate that Mr. Bell's colour notes and exquisite 

 plates were made from living specimens. In fact, the colour de- 

 scription for this species, given by him and quoted by subsequent 

 writers, applies in detail to the spirit preserved specimens taken 

 by the "Alva" three years ago, which are definitely known to 

 have changed colour. 



Technical description : The carapace, which is wide, nearly 

 oval, measures 110 millimeters greatest width and 63 millimeters 



