BY THE REV, J. E. TENISON-WOODS. 1045 



Animal similar to the animal of Helix, with a simple jaw.* 



Radida similar also to Helix Between 300 and 400 species, 

 mostly South American, f 



* It cannot be questioned that Scopoli rather than Adanson should be 

 given as the authority for this genus, although the author of the work 

 referred to in the text says distinctly, " Proprium itaque ex his constituo, 

 et duce celeberrimo Adansonio Bulrmos voco, ut eo facilius adnoscantur. 

 Solam testam nee animal inhabitans vidi, quod diversum esse a Limace 

 afflrmat Adansonius." p. 67. 



Cf. Histoire Naturelle du S(5nt5gal (Paris, 1757), where M. Adanson 

 writes the name Bulin. The Latin (?) name on pi. 1 looks very much like 

 Bulimus inconsequence of the strokes of the " n " and "u" being con- 

 fused. A brief account of this curious work may be useful. It is divided 

 into two parts; the first of 190 pages is devoted to the "V9yage au 

 S6n^gal ;" the second part is a " Histoire des Coquillages, " consisting of: — 

 1. Preface, 28 pp. ; 2. Definitions des parties des coquillages, 32 pp. (a 

 most useful series of observations well deserving of study) ; 3. Table des 

 rajjports ou des combinaisons autrement appellees systi^mes ou arrangements 

 methodiques, 26 pp. ; 4. Table chronologique des auteurs, 4 pp. ; 5. 

 Division generale, 4 pp. ; 6. Coquillages (including index), 275 pp. ; 7. 

 Plates, 19 pp. At p. 5 of the Coquillages is a full description which 

 extends to three pages of Le Bulin or Bulinus, from which only the first 

 sentence need be cited, as it shows the author is dealing with a fresh-water 

 shell. '• Je donne le nom de Bulin a un petit coquillage d' eau douce, qui 

 vit commun^ment sur la lentille de marais et sur le lemma, dans les marais 

 et les ^tangs de Podor. " Therefore Scopoli's genus, spelled differently, is 

 justly regarded as new. 



+ It is a curious feature in the Philippine and some of the Malay species 

 that the varieties of pattern, which constitute their chief ornament, reside 

 only in the epidermis. The colours of the shell rarely describe any sort of 

 configuration ; they are mostly blended into a uniform tint, over which a 

 fanciful pattern is produced by the epidermis forming a double porous 

 membrane in some places, and a single one only in others, developed, 

 moreover, with the same continuous regularity as the textile marking of a 

 Volute or Cone. This phenomenon is easily detected by immersing the 

 shell in water, when the light portion or upper porous layer of epidermis 

 becomes saturated, and the ground color of the shell is seen through it ; as 

 the moisture evaporates, the epidermis resumes its light appearance. Sir 

 David Brewster, in reply to a letter frona Mr. Broderip on this subject, 

 says : '^ It appears to me, from very careful observations, that the epidermis 

 consists of two layers, and that it is only the upper layer which is porous 

 wherever the pattern is white. These white or porous portions of the 



