H A L I A 



Plate I. 



Genus IIALIA, Eisso. 



Testa oblonyo-ovata, veiitricuia, teiiidcida, spird subexsei'td, 

 apice obtusa, anfracttbug qidnque ad sex, lavhjalls, 

 siticorneis, superni obtuse declivi-angulatis, columella 

 arcuatd, versus basin calloso-involutu, truncatd ; aper- 

 turd ampld, supra et infra sinuatd, labro simplici. 



Shell obloug-ovate, ventricose, rather thin, spire some- 

 what exserted, obtuse at the apex, whorls five to six, 

 smooth, slightly horny, obtusely slopingly angled, 

 columella arched, callously involute towards the base, 

 truncated ; aperture large, simiated above and below, 

 lip simple. 



The very characteristic shell, of which back aud front 

 views of two specimens are given in the accompanying 

 plate, appears to have been first known about the same 

 time in Germany and England, between eighty and ninety 

 years ago. In Germany it was named by Meuschen, in 

 the Catalogue of the Gronovian ]Museum (177S), Helix 

 Priamus, indicative of its belonging to a terrestrial niollusk. 

 In England its generic character and habitat were more 

 correctly designated, for it was named by Martyn in his 

 'Universal Conchologist,' Buccinum ficus, from Spain, aud 

 illustrated by two very beautiful drawings. 



Various conjectures have been made by naturalists as to 

 its place in the system, some referring it to Bulla, but the 

 greater number, including all the higher authorities, — • 

 Bruguiere, Lamarck, Ferussac, — have inclined to the 

 opinion that it must belong to a land snail of the Glandiiia 

 section of Achatiiia. After the lapse of more than half a 

 century, the notion of its being the shell of a sea moUusk 

 was revived by the Danish conchologist, Dr. Beck, who 

 became possessed of some new information on the subject, 

 which he communicated to M. Deshayes while engaged 

 upon his edition of Lamarck's Anira. sans vert. In vol. viii. 

 of that work, in a note to p. 300, published in 1S38, M. Des- 

 hayes announced that the shell under consideration coulil 

 no longer remain in Achaliaa, Dr. Beck having informed 

 hiiu that it belonged to a marine operculated mollusk living 

 in the seas of Spain and Portugal, aud that it must hence- | 

 forth rank as a new gi^ims allied to Buccinum, for which 

 the old specific name of Priamus was proposed. This in- 

 formation helped to confirm the original statement of 

 Martyn, which has been overlooked by all subsequent 

 writers, that the shell was a " Buccinum from Spain ;" 

 but the intiraalion conveyed by Dr. Beck, that the animal 

 is operculated, has been since shown to be erroneous. 



In 1846 it was discovered by Herrmannsen that the 

 Priamus is identical with a fossil of the miocene beds of 

 Turin, named by Brocchi Bulla helicoides (Conch. Foss. 

 Subapp. ISl-t, p. 283), for which Risso had iu 182ii 

 (Hist. Nat. Prod. Europe Merid.vol. iv.) proposed a new- 

 genus with the name of Ilalia. No doubt is now enter- 

 tained of the recent Helix Priamus of Meuschen being 

 identical with the fossil Bulla helicoides of Brocchi, and 

 now that our knowledge of the animal justifies us in 

 making it the type of a separate genus the generic name 

 of Priamus gives way to that of Halia, proposed twelve 

 years before by Eisso. 



In 1858 all doubt as to the character and habits of tiiis 

 mollusk were set at rest in an able monograph Ijy M. P. 

 Fischer, of Paris, published in the third volume of the 

 second series of the 'Journal de Conchyliologie.' M. 

 Fischer already possessed a fragment of the animal, col- 

 lected by a French botanist, M. Picard, travelling on the 

 coast of Spain, when a more perfect specimen, preserved 

 in spirits, sent to him by a Spanish gentleman, M. de 

 Elizalde, enabled him to complete the anatomy. The re- 

 sult of M. Fischer's dissection went to show that there were 

 no traces of an opereidigerous lobe nor of any operculum, 

 and that in iho principal features of its organization the 

 animal is nearest allied to the inopercnlated Defrancia 

 section of Pleurotomu. 



Another specimen ol Halia, with tlie animal, lately re- 

 ceived from Vigo Bay by Islx. Darbishire, of ilanchester, 

 has, I believe, been submitted for dissection to the care of 

 Jlr. Albany Hancock, of Newcastle. 



Species 1. (Fig. a, h, Mns. Cuming; Fig. c, d, Mus. 

 Newman Smith.) 



Halia Priamus. Hal. testd ovatu, tenuiculd, ventrir.osd, 

 fuho-spadiced, subcorned, niaculis rubro-castaneis 

 quadrutis snbremotis, nisi circa anfracluuni partem 

 superiorem, fasciatim aspersd, anfraclibus Icevibus, 

 niteutibus, iuterdum quasi encausticis, vel lonyitudi- 

 naliler arcualim plicato-striatis, columella arcuatd, 

 callosd, subcontortd ; aperturd ampld, utrinque sinuatd, 

 labro simplici. 



The Priam Halia. Shell ovate, rather thin, ventricose, 

 fulvons-fawn, rather horny, sprinkled except about 

 the upper part of the whorls with bands of distant 

 square reddish-chestnut spots, whorls smooth, shi- 



Ausust, 1863. 



