4 TAND AND FRESHWATER 
Much has lately appeared in the public press on “ Research.” 
It is of interest to put a case like this on record (if only to show how 
valuable scientific work and knowledge is lost for ever for want of 
Government support.) To show how research is valued and 
rewarded, Museuims are built at an enormous known cost and filled 
with specimens at an enormous unknown cost; then a proper 
scientific Staff to deal with them is grudged, expenses are cut down, 
and the record is never utilized. In this instance Nevill lost the 
credit which many years of close study should have brought him— 
not among those he had worked with, but among the general public. 
Lam glad I have the opportunity of bringing his labours to notice. 
The best account of the genus is to be found in the ‘ Manual of 
Conchology,’ ser. 2, xx. 1908, commencing p. 50—the excellent 
work of Dr. Henry A. Pilsbry, with copious good illustrations, not 
only of the shells, but of the sculpture and of the embryonic apex. 
He says (p. 52):—** From the purely conchological standpoint we 
may be said to have an extensive knowledge of Gilessula, yet various 
characters of the first importance have been neglected. The 
embryonic whorls of the types must be all re-examined, and their 
sculpture described. Our ignorance of the embryonic sculpture of 
many forms prevents any natural classification of the species. 
The surface of the later whorls in all the species should be 
examined under high power, since some species have a minute 
sculpture not visible with an ordinary lens.” Further on, he 
adds: “* No natural classification of the species of Glessula can be 
attempted until the sculpture of the apices of the shells and 
the anatomy of a number of representative species are studied.” 
Bearing this truly excellent advice in mind, I have endeavoured to 
follow it when describing the many species of the genus now known 
from the Eastern Frontier of India and Burma. 
Pilsbry* has given a good réswmé of what has been done in this 
genus and all that was known of the anatomy at that time. For 
this last we are indebted to the research of Professor C. Semper, 
who published, in his ‘ Reisen im Archipel der Philippinen,’ 1873, 
p- 133, pl. xii. figs. 14-16 to pl. xvi. fig. 19, an anatomical, descrip- 
tion of Glessula orophila, Benson, said to have come from Madras, 
but it might have been collected in any part of Peninsular India. 
It is unfortunate Semper’s determination is open to doubt: we 
shall never know whether the shell of the animal he dissected was 
compared with the type of Benson’s orophila, or what has become 
of that type described by Reeve. The species is not recorded in the 
* Conchologia Indica,’ so Hanley never could have seen it. There 
ire no specimens assigned to G. orophila in either the William or 
Henry Blanford collections. Beddome records the species from the 
Anamullay Hills; South Canara; Golconda Hills, east side of 
the Madras Presidency, and says, ‘‘ My Golconda specimens were 
labelled by H. Nevill G. subbrevis, but I cannot see how they 
* Man. Conch. ser. 2, xx. 1908, pl. xviii. 
