PATELLA. 433 
and this strict interpretation of the expression becomes more 
needful, smce only two more specific characteristics (for the 
“‘vertice perforato” is generic) are mentioned in the brief 
diagnosis. Hven the name was evidently derived from Tourne- 
fort (a pupil of Linnezus, whose work is one of those referred 
to), who has remarked that the mollusk was frequently eaten 
by the inhabitants of Greece. 
Patella winbosa, 
So utterly inadequate is the extremely brief account of this 
shell in the ‘Systema,’ that one might fancy its diagnosis had 
been expressly framed for the purpose of comprehending all 
the known Fissurelle, which could not be included in the 
definition of the three other described members of the genus 
(Nos. 779, 780, 782). The synonymy was a fearful mass of 
confusion, even in the tenth edition, where at least half a score 
of species were confounded in the three references (Gualtier, 
Lister, and Argenville): in the twelfth edition it was rendered 
still more intricate by the addition of two more distinct Fissu- 
relle delineated by Adanson and Petiver, and by the citation of 
the execrable figures of Bonanni, Ginanni, and Columna. None 
of these shells precisely correspond with the language of our 
author, unless perchance some of those in Gualtier, which do 
not appear to have been positively recognised. It is highly 
probable that the published quotation (“t. 1, 2”’) of two whole 
plates of Lister’s ‘Historie,’ containing no less than seven 
widely different limpets, was a misprint for ‘‘t. 2, f. 2,” as its 
modern equivalent “t. 528, f.4” has been substituted in the 
revised copy of the tenth editicn ; in the twelfth, figures 91, 92 
of Martini’s ‘ Conchylien’ have been likewise indicated as illus- 
trative. Since both these engravings represent the Fissurella 
nimbosa of authors, they corroborate the arbitrary selection of 
that shell as the Linnean Patella, of which no example is 
recorded to be present in his collection. 
The expressions “ovalis,’ “alba aut sanguinea, costis nu- 
merosis confertis nodosis” (M. U.) do not harmonise: with the 
“ ovata, striata rugosa fusca”’ of the diagnosis ; it is likely, then, 
3K 
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