STYLIFER. 191 
FAMILY PYRAMIDELLADA. 
This is an extensive group of small, and for the 
most part, minute shells, which often display much 
beauty to the close observer; their forms being in 
general elegantly turreted, their surfaces smooth, 
often polished, or ornamented with the most beau- 
tiful and elaborate sculpture. The aperture is 
entire, and not lengthened into a canal; the pillar 
or inner lip is often plaited. 
The animals are furnished with a retractile 
proboscis, and with tentacles of varying form, 
with the eyes not set on footstalks, but immersed 
in the bases. The tongue is remarkable for being 
unarmed with teeth. 
As the fossil remains of a former world present 
the extinct forms of this family in great numbers 
and variety, the group is one of much interest to 
the geologist. 
GENUS STYLIFER. 
I select the genus Stylifer to illustrate the 
family, because of its singular form and still more 
curlous economy, rather than for its abundance in 
these latitudes, for it is represented on the British 
coast by a single species, and that of very rare 
occurrence. 
The shell is somewhat globose, with the tip 
slender, and projecting in the form of a little 
point or style; its surface is smooth and polished ; 
its whorls are numerous. ‘There is no operculum. 
The animal has slender tentacles, and eyes 
immersed at their bases; the mantle has been 
described as thick, fleshy, cup-shaped, enveloping 
