Fig. 38. X f (*) 



64 WEST COAST SHELLS 



thus connecting the fauna of the Atlantic and the 

 Pacific oceans. 



The members of the genus My- 

 sella are very small creatures, 

 with thin, sometimes transparent 

 shells. Figure 38 represents the 

 inside of a valve of Mysella aleu- 

 tica^ Dall, the Aleutian Mysella. 

 Its shell is solid, smooth, and white, and it is cov- 

 ered with a polished, straw-colored epidermis. Its 

 length is only 4.3 mm. 



A closely related shell is the little Lasea ruhra^ 

 ' Montagu, the Red Lasea. As the name indicates, 

 it is reddish-brown in color. This shell is found 

 living on the coast of England, as well as on this 

 coast. It loves to hide in the root-like holdfasts of 

 seaweeds and in cracks of the rocks. Jeffreys says 

 that it is viviparous, and that it lives as much out of 

 the sea as in it. 



Another little creature that lives on the shores of 

 the Atlantic and the Pacific is '^urtonia minuta^ 

 Fabr., which the naturalist, Rev. J. G. Wood, calls 

 the Little Mullet-shell, because it is often found in 

 the stomachs of mullets. He advises all zoologists 

 to examine the stomachs of such fishes as they can 

 secure, since they often contain objects of much in- 

 terest. "This little shell," says he, "is about the 

 size of a capital O, is exceedingly thin, purple-brown 

 in hue, dark at the beak. It may be found by look- 

 ing among the roots of corallines and other Algie." 

 On our side of the world it lives on the coast of 

 northern Alaska. 



