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Family lY. Alata. 



A list of names ; nought else ! AVhat use the noting 

 Of creatures that dwell deep 'neath raging waves ? 

 Speak rather of such curious shells as grace 

 Our banks, or stream-sides, or beside the main. 

 Not yet. This wondrous brotherhood of forms 

 May well detain us, to describe how one. 

 Like Polypheme, with his lone searching eye. 

 Progresses on ; and how, with two-lobed foot, 

 Another leaps from tangled weed to stone ; 

 And, strange to say, one lobe supports an eye, 

 Held up to scan the way, as men at night 

 Their lanterns hold ; whilst others keep at home 

 And ply their labours with artistic skill. 



Wing-like expansions of the outer lip distinguish this 

 interesting family ; and first among its six genera stands 

 Priamus, with his light, horny, semi- porcellaneous shell. 

 This peculiarity, taken in connection with the absence of 

 epidermis, and a wide-spread stain in contact with the 

 animal inhabitant, leads to the supposition that the creature 

 is of large size, and able to envelope his shell to some con- 

 siderable extent ; that, further, he is probably an inhabitant 

 of deep water, and that if his shell was subjected to micro- 



