Transactions. 105 



may not be thrown away on any here present who may be 

 induced to work in this department. Of the three very common 

 garden snails, H. Aspersa, nemoralis, and hortensis, it is scarcely 

 necessary to say more than that, in most people's opinion, the 

 less we have and see of them the better for our gardens and our- 

 selves. H. arbiistorum is almost as common, if not indeed in 

 some localities more frequent than hortensis. Many of the 

 Zonites are abundant — nitidulus and cellariics especially. 

 Claicsilia rugosa may be found in the chinks of many an old wall 

 by the score ; //. hispida and concinna with v. subru/a. I have 

 taken dozens off in a very few minutes from under the leaves 

 of strawberry plants ; while you can hardly lift a biggish stone 

 on a crumbly bank of rubbish and "weeds" without seeing II. 

 rotundata. Among the aquatic moUusks Valvata cristata, 

 Planorbis NautiJeus, L. palustris, and A n. lacuslris are the rarest 

 — the last I have found only in one locality, in the water of Tarff. 

 Sphaerium carneum and Bithynia teutaculata are to be seen 

 in numberless quantities in many a shallow runlet of the Dee, 

 more particularly near Threave Castle. 



And now, lastly, for a brief paragraph of suggestion to any 

 members who may be induced to give the help of their enthusiasm 

 in working out the distribution of our moUusks. It is always 

 pleasant to break up virgin soil — to work in a new field — to 

 explore. And in hunting for mollusks in Galloway and Dum- 

 friesshire there is, besides this charm, the added attractiveness of 

 its beautifully-varied natural scenery and rock configuration — a 

 potent factor in our botany, and one which, I am sanguine enough 

 to think, may be quite as interesting in almost every other 

 department of natural science. Other motives for collecting 

 mollusks are, the comparative easiness of the work, the slight 

 outfit required, the small space into which your specimens can be 

 stowed, ready at any moment for reference and study. Then 

 the actual charm of the quest itself, e.g., the exciting events of a 

 good day's dredging over a lonely loch, hauling up with your 

 stout line and grapple perhaps a cluster of Auodonta;, or an ante- 

 diluvian boot, a battered and rusty axe head, or some long 

 searched for tiny mollusk like Planorbis nautileus, or a rare 

 aquatic plant ; the delight of watcliing, as you lie full length on 

 the flowery brink of some pellucid stream, its tiny deeps and 

 shallows, with the minnows "staying their wavy bodies 'gainst 

 the stream," or its amber pools where innumerable Limncni and 



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