492 TROCHID^. 



zezypha. The " ziziphino colore depictus" (painted like 

 the fruit of the jujube) of Gualtier's description, was pro- 

 bably the immediate source of the specific appellation. This 

 shell is subject to a peculiarly wide range of variation in 

 form, sculpture, and colouring, yet always so far preserves 

 the essential elements of its specific character as to render 

 a well-defined division of it into two or more species 

 almost an impossibility. Otherwise the small deep water 

 variety from our Northern and Irish coasts, is so aberrant, 

 as almost to warrant its separation from the normal form. 



The shell is tolerably strong, opaque or nearly so, and 

 more or less shining ; the shape is always purely conical, 

 but varies considerably in the relative proportions of height 

 of spire and breadth of base ; the lateral outlines are 

 slightly concave. The painting consists of several wavy 

 longitudinal blotches or flames of pinkish red, dark liver- 

 colour, or ruddy flesh colour, on a ground of citron flesh- 

 colour, or more rarely warm reddish brown, that frequently 

 changes to a livid or bluish hue toward the summit of the 

 spire. The ground tint is sometimes of a bluish-slate, and 

 the entire shell at times is quite devoid of colour ; often- 

 times, too, the reddish stains are confined to the base of 

 each volution, where they form a kind of subarticulated 

 fillet (in one of our scarcer varieties this is of a vivid 

 purple) ; rarely if ever do they extend further than the 

 margin of the base. They are chiefly conspicuous upon 

 the bluntly angulated basal circumference. The whorls 

 are eight to ten in number, of not very rapid increase, 

 much shelving, and rather flattened, or even subretuse ; in 

 the smooth variety they are more rounded ; in the larger 

 individuals of the common littoral form, they are occa- 

 sionally a little retuse on the body and penult volutions. 

 The apex is very small and acute, and near it, the narrow 



