BY C. HEDLEY. 259 



and a good illustration appeared as each name was introduced, 

 few of the synonyms noted in the following pages would have 

 occurred; and most of those that did, would have been readily 

 detected. 



Australian writers have frequently been misled by Tryon, who 

 hastily united species which, though then indefinite in literature, 

 were distinct in nature. 



Study on the spot intensified my impression of the damage 

 done to science by the conchological organisation of Hugh 

 Cuming. It is difficult to understand how this illiterate sailor, 

 by mere force of character, could have controlled the leading 

 conchological writers of his time. But that he did so control 

 and debase them, is clear. It is evident that Deshayes, in deal- 

 ing with material sent by Cuming, surrendered his own clear 

 judgment, exercised no discrimination, and confined himself to 

 "describing " what species Cuming desired to be named as new. 

 Reeve's sweeping criticism of the work of Deshayes on the genus 

 Terebra* explains this. The treatment of Pfeiffer was apparently 

 similar. 



Tracing the work of Arthur Adams, with his actual specimens 

 in hand, one is the more impressed by his slovenly and unscien- 

 tific methods. His papers correct an unusual number of his own 

 clerical errors. He frequently ascribed foreign species to Aus- 

 tralia, and Australian species to other continents. 



In the Hancock Museum, Newcastle, England, I found an 

 extensive series of Australian shells, George French Angas, the 

 author of so many papers on Australian conchology, who died in 

 London, 4th October, 1886, was the eldest son of (Jeorge Fife 

 Angas, of Newcastle-on-Tyne.f Most of the types of Australian 

 marine shells described by Angas, or from his collection by 

 Crosse, were given to the British Museum during his lifetime. 

 But at his death, his land-shells were bequeathed to the Museum 

 of his native city. Here I observed the following forty species, 



* Reeve, Proc. Zool. Soc, 1860, p. 448. 

 fFor an autobiographical sketch, see "The Little Journal," London, 

 May, 1884, Vol. i., No.3, pp.230-234. 



