402 Mr. Svvainson on Mclania Sttosa. 



bristly structure of this shell remains unique. Mr. Gray has yet 

 to learn the difference between analogy and affinity. For it is 

 rather curious to see the manner in which he confounds them. 

 After enumerating certain analogous resemblances in other shells 

 to the tubular spines of the Melania setosa, Mr. Gray, (quite 

 forgetting its bristles,) very logically concludes by saying, " that 

 it does not therefore exhibit any anomalous formation." I have 

 stated, that these bristles appear imbedded at their base in the 

 very substance of the shell. This is denied, and an argument 

 used, which any one would think, was intended to verify my sup- 

 position. Mr. Gray's reason, and the inference he draws from it, 

 arc as follows. " The base of the tube at length becomes closed 

 by the deposition of shelly matter on the inside, and thus they 

 (the bristles !) do not become imbedded." Why this deposition 

 of shelly matter, should not be the very substance that would 

 imbed the base of the bristles, is altogether inexplicable. 



I now come to the figures of this shell ; which from the known 

 accuracy of Mr. Sowerby, I take for granted are correct portraits 

 of those which Mr. Gray has examined. These figures represent 

 two mutilated specimens. The spines and bristles in the smallest 

 are much broken ; while in the larger shell the spines are no less 

 injured ; and the bristles totally gone ! From such materials has 

 this writer drawn his observations. 



I am fearful, Gentlemen, that I have occupied too much of your 

 time, as well as of my own, in noticing this frivolous production, 

 which with its reply, can do little honor to the pages of your 

 Journal, filled, as they should be, with communications of far 

 greater importance. 



A Journal expressly devoted to Zoology, is altogether a novelty 

 among British Naturalists, and as many will be eager to take ad-r 

 vantage of the facility it offers of communicating their remarks to 

 the public, it may be as well to suggest a few hints to such as, 

 in a good spirit, aspire to be enrolled in the annals of their fa- 

 vourite Science. Let us not believe, however, that this distinc- 

 tion is to he gained by dressing the ideas of others in a new phra- 

 seology of our own ; or by attacking their opinions, before we well 

 understand their meaning. Neither is fame to be acquired by as- 



