458 FUNAFUTI ATOLL. 
Represented in this Museum from Port Curtis, Queensland, 
and New Caledonia. 
Murex apustus, Lamarck. 
Tryon, Man. Conch., ii, 1880, p. 90, pl. xv., figs. 148, 149 ; pl. 
xxiv., figs. 210-212; pl. xxv., fig. 217 
Common in shallow water in the lagoon of Funafuti. 
Noted from Lifu by Melvill and Standen, and represented in 
this Museum from New Caledonia. 
MouREX FUNAFUTIENSIS, Sp. nov. 
(Fig. 35). 
Shell small, biconical. Colour ochra- 
ceous buff, banded with chocolate, 
interior of aperture pale lilac. Whorls 
seven, sculptured each with seven pro- 
minent varices, which mount the spire 
continuously and obliquely. On the 
spire each varix presents a hollow spine 
above a blunt tubercle. Between and 
parallel to the varices are a series of 
imbricating lamelle. Five spiral ridges 
run round the shoulder of the shell, 
and undulate both the blades and the 
interstices of the varices. The lamellie 
are likewise microscopically beaded by 
minute spiral threads. The aperture is 
oblique, ovate, choked by an inner 
tuberculate ridge, and by the great 
development of the columella; the 
latter is arched, deeply obliquely enter- 
ing, anteriorly with two incipient tubercles, and truncate below. 
Canal short, open, and recurved ; above it are two series of 
disused canals, corresponding to the ultimate and penultimate 
varices. Length 9, breadth 5 mm. 
Fig. 35. 
One specimen, taken by tangles, at a depth of forty to eighty 
fathoms, on the western slope of Funafuti. 
This species approaches nearest to Murex nuclea, Reeve,* 
which it resembles both in colour and form. Judging from his 
account of that species, it differs by being just half the size, by 
having seven whorls instead of five, with seven varices apiece 
instead of six, and especially by being longer in proportion to 
breadth than the Philippine shell is. Whether these differences 
are constant or not I cannot say. 
* Reeve—Conch. Icon. iii., 1845, Murex, pl. xxix., sp. 131. 
