292 BULLETIN OF THE 



elsewhere. This would seem to be nearest to V. granulata Seguenza, in my 

 opinion unwisely combined by several authors with V. trapezoidea. V. granu- 

 lata is as yet but imperfectly known, but seems to have only about half as 

 many ribs as the present species. 



Family CUSPIDAEIID^ Dall. 

 Genus CUSPIDARIA Nardo. 



Cuspidaria Nardo, Revue Zoologique, Jan. 18i0, p. 30. (In report of the meeting 



of the Congres Scientifique at Pisa, paper read Oct. 11, 1839.) Type Tellina 



cuspidata Olivi. 

 Necera Gray, in Griffith's Cuvier, legend to plate xxii. fig. 5 (dated 1833, whole 



volume issued in 1834. Type N. chinensis Gray, in Index, p. 698) ; Synops. 



Brit. Museum, 1840, fide Gray in P. Z. S., 1847. 

 Not Neara Robineau-Desvoidy, Essai sur les Myodaires, 1830. 



Valves with one or more teeth. 



The name Necera being preoccupied in entomology, the next name, Cuspi- 

 daria, must necessfirily be adopted. The longer an untenable name is retained, 

 the more inconvenience results to science when it is, as it always will be, 

 eventually overthrown. Gray's name at any rate has a very slender claim to 

 priority, as the genus is not mentioned in the text or described anywhere, the 

 generic name is mis-spelled in the index of plates to Griffith's edition of Cuvier, 

 and we are left to conjecture who is its author. Gray himself, in Agassiz's 

 Nomenclator, only claimed it from the Synopsis?, which I have not been able to 

 examine, and which was quite likely subsequent to the publication of Nardo's 

 diagnosis in the January number of the Revue. 



The group has been reviewed by Arthur Adams, who has proposed several 

 generic or subgeneric names and eliminated some incongruous species. Dr. 

 Jeffreys has also made a division into sections based on the sculpture of the 

 shell. Lastly, Mr. Edgar A. Smith has most carefully investigated the charac- 

 ters of a large number of species, especially with regard to the hinge, arranged 

 them in lettered sections pending further study, and tabulated the results. To 

 this I am much indebted for help. It will not be necessary for our purposes 

 to review the entire group, but merely those sections of it which contain 

 species represented in the Blake collection, or which are in some way aflFected 

 by this investigation. 



The new subdivisions here instituted appear as proposed by Dall and Smith ; 

 a course taken with Mr. Smith's permission, and which I have felt to be due 

 to him, owing to the assistance I have derived from his valuable observations 

 on this group. 



The shells of Cuspidaria possess an internal ligament, received in each valve 

 in a more or less differentiated groove or fossette, which may project from the 



