148 Records of the Indian Museum [Voi,. XVI, 



was one of those which rushes down the hill-side, but the mollusc 

 only occurred where it broadened out and its currents became less 

 strong as it crossed a small plain. We figure (fig. 7, pi. v) the 

 radular teeth of a specimen from Khandalla. 



P. obesa seems to be the most widely distributed of the 

 Indian species. It was described from the Bombay Deccan, but 

 one of us collected a large series some j^ears ago at Courtallum in 

 South India. These specimens were examined by Mr. Preston, 

 who, however, with his habitual indifference to geography, makes no 

 reference to them. It was noted at the time that they replaced 

 P. annandalei, Preston, an abundant species on the ledges above 

 waterfalls on the western side of the Western Ghats at Tenmalai, 

 where the railway crosses that range, as soon as the eastern water- 

 shed was reached. The range of P. ohesa may, therefore, be des- 

 cribed as consisting of the western part of the Indian Peninsular 

 area, properly" so called, as distinct from the Malabar Zone to the 

 west and the Indo-Gangetic Plain to the north. Khandalla, how- 

 ever, lies technically within the limits of the Malabar Zone. We 

 regard this species provisionally as distinct from P. tanjoriensis , 

 etc, see Blanford, Trans. Linn. Soc, XXIV, p. 173 (1863). 



Family Littorinidae. 

 Genus Crcmnoconchus (Blanford). 



1863. Cremnobates. Blanford, Ann. Mng. Nat. Hist. (3) XII, p. 184, pi. i\ . 

 1869. Cremn'oconchiis, Blanford, Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. (4) III, p. 343. 

 1871. Cremnoconclnis, Stoliczka, Proc. Asiat. Soc. Bengal, p. 108, 



figs. 1-4. 

 1878. Cremnoconclnis, Blanford, yoiirn. As. Soc. Bengal, XXXIX (iij, 



p. 10. 

 1887. Cremnoconchns, Fischer, Conclivliologie, pp. 708-709 



We have no doubt that Blanford and Stoliczka were right 

 in referring this genus to the family Littorinidae. Blanford says 

 {loc. cit. 1863): "Every character of shell, operculum and animal 

 with the one exception of the pulmoniferous sac admits of the 

 position I have assigned to it amongst the Littorinidae." As 

 Stoliczka has shown, the gill is present, and the branchial cham- 

 ber is less like that of the Pulmonata than Blanford imagined. 

 The osphradium is present, but much reduced and almost papilli- 

 form (pi. iv, fig. 3K As to the origin of the genus, which lives 

 on inland cliffs kept moist by the spray from waterfalls, we can 

 add nothing to Blanford 's statement. " No question can exist as 

 to the Western Ghats having been formed from a marine cliff in 

 comparatively recent geological times. Whether Cremnobates be 

 a lineal descendant of the Littorinas or Fossars then inhabiting 

 the coast may perhaps not be an unfair subject for speculation." 



A species has since been described from French Indo-China,' 

 but the shell differs considerably from that of the Western Indian 

 forms, and nothing is known of the soft parts. 



^ ^^\a.y el Xy3i\iV/,enhercr^ ypitrji. de Conchyliologie. XI. VIII, pp. Ii6, 449, 

 pi. X, fig. 10 (1900). 



