20 LAND AND FRESHWATER 
tooth, the inner cusp being slightly longer than the median, and 
that again than the outer. The laterals decrease rapidly in size to 
the outermost, which are small, short, and tricuspid (fig. 11 a). 
Benson was the first to discover this shell. He notes finding it 
at Patharghata in September, and also at Berhampur (J. A. S. B. 
1836, p. 357). 
In continuation of what has been recorded of this species (pp. 2, 
3, 4), I may mention that I have seen the two examples in the 
British Museum, marked from India only, the types described by 
Pfeiffer out of the Cuming collection. They have all the appear- 
ance of specimens from Mussoorie. In the same collection are a 
number sent from that part of India by Captain T. Hutton, who 
distributed this shell to several collectors about the same time. 
They are of the sienna-brown colour which is characteristic of the 
N.W. Himalayan form (sivalensis). 
Benson, in the Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist., May 1863, records that 
this species was obtained by Mr. F. Layard at Kandookerre, in 
Lower Ourah, Ceylon. I have not seen any myself from that part 
of India. 
The most interesting and remarkable fact in distribution is the 
occurrence of the genus Aaliella in Madagascar. My attention has 
been only lately drawn to this by Mr. Edgar Smith, of the British 
Museum, who obtained the specimens from Mr. W. Johnson, who 
collected them at a place ‘in the outskirts of the upper forest, 
28 miles east of Antananarivo,” the capital of the island. Mr. Edgar 
Smith has kindly sent me a specimen, and having compared it side 
by side with species from different parts of India, I found it agreed 
very closely with the Nilgiri variety in Mr. W. T. Blanford’s collection 
which I named sigurensis. From the N.W. and East-Himalayan 
forms it differs in the columellar margin being less oblique, and 
the peristome more rounded below, giving a larger aperture. It 
measures in major diam. 3:6, alt. axis 2°9 millim. The Madagascan 
Kaliella can therefore stand as K. siqurensis, or as K, barrakporensis, 
var, sigurensis, or simply var. No two naturalists are agreed as to 
where a variety ends and a species begins ; in fact there is no defined 
line; I prefer, however, when there is.a decided change of form in 
some character or another, and constant over a separate area, to 
distinguish such forms bya name. It is this gradual change which 
is so interesting when studying and following out any group over a 
wide extent of country. 
Mr. Johnson says, ‘‘ It was not in or near any garden or human 
habitation, nor could any introduced plants have got there.” He 
found them “on the ground, among bracken fern, in a scrap of 
forest. A fire had passed over the place a year(?) previously, and 
these shells were hidden among the light black earth and leaves, on 
high ground, above a cliff or brow of rock, below which was thick 
forest.” The shells were very scarce, he ‘could only find a few 
specimens, except blanched ones.” This account certainly supports 
the view that the shell has not been introduced ; and we may con- 
sider it one of the several forms that formerly had a far more ex- 
