CIRCE. 449 



Fine examples attain to five-eighths of an inch in length, 

 and usually a trifle less in breadth ; in the more triangular 

 specimens these proportions are reversed, the breadth a 

 little exceeding the length. 



The animal is orbicular and compressed, its texture not 

 very solid. The mantle is freely open, and indistinctly 

 fimbriated or denticulated, white with obscure dots. Pos- 

 teriorly it projects a little, and is closed to form two 

 siphonal orifices, the branchial much larger than the anal, 

 the margins of each with a close-set fringe of short cirrhi, 

 which are dusky or dotted with brown or red, varying in 

 different examples. The foot is white, linguiform, and 

 geniculated, resembling that of Venus. It can be projected 

 to a considerable distance, and when protruded is acute. 

 The branchige are yellowish-white, the liver dark brown. 

 The labial palps are long, linear, and pointed. Its habits 

 are rather sluggish. 



Until lately the Circe minima was regarded as one of our 

 rarest testacea, and specimens were not often to be seen in 

 our collections. Those which Montagu examined were 

 very small and in poor condition. The activity of scientific 

 dredgers, during the last few years, has made it compara- 

 tively common ; large and beautifully coloured British ex- 

 amples now decorate all our best cabinets. It is, however, 

 still to be respected as one of our scarcer species, for, though 

 plentiful in certain localities, it does not fall within every 

 collector's reach. The largest and most brilliant individuals 

 we know are dredged in about eight fathoms water off St. 

 Peter's Port, in the island of Guernsey (S. H.). On the 

 coast of Cornwall, it was noticed by Montagu, and we have 

 taken it in twenty fathoms off Penzance ; on the Welsh 

 coast it is both remarkably abundant and beautiful in 

 ten fathoms in Milford Haven (M'Andrew and E. F.). In 



VOL. I. 3 m 



