Mr. L. Reeve on the Geographical Distribution of the B ulimi . 243 



of which the darker varieties inhabit the higher and woodier 

 situations. They are rarely found at a greater elevation or in a 

 lower temperature than about 76° within doors. Proceeding up- 

 wards on the mountains of Venezuela, the plants are now thicker, 

 and give place to large trees with underwood of broad green 

 leaves, enveloped in clouds and mists which occasion considerable 

 humidity. In these situations at an elevation of from 4000 to 

 6000 feet are the richly-coloured B.fulminans and Blainvilleanus, 

 and at a still greater altitude reaching to 8000 feet, with a pro- 

 portionably lower temperature of from 65° to 70°, under decayed 

 leaves in thick moist woods, in ravines and in crevices of the 

 mountains, are the large stout dark-painted B. Moritzianus, as- 

 trapoides, pardalis, Funckii, &c., representing the most highly 

 calcified condition of the genus hitherto discovered. 



2. The Brazilian Province. 

 Passing in a south-easterly direction into the great territory 

 of Brazil, we have no information of the presence of any typical 

 assemblages of Bulimi until reaching the countries of Bahia and 

 Minas Geraes. It can hardly be doubted, however, that m Guay- 

 ana, Para, and all that country constituting the great basin of 

 the Amazon, many fine species occur, in addition to B. Bensom, 

 which belongs to the widely spread B. zebra type, as well as m 

 Piauhy, Goyaz, and the more sterile parts of Pernambuco. From 

 Bahia southwards to Rio Janeiro, the genus is represented by 

 about sixty species, in six characteristic typical groups, extremely 

 local, and of which the shell differs remarkably in its plan of 

 convolution. In no part of the American continent is the theory 

 of specific centres of creation, advocated by Professor E. Forbes, so 

 distinctly recognized as in this area of ten degrees. On the 

 Corcovado and other lofty mountains in the vicinity of Rio, in 

 dense woods at an elevation of 1000 to 1500 feet, is a singular 

 group, B. Pantagruelinus, exesus, odontostoma, Pupoides, &c., of 

 which the shell differs from all other types of the new world, in 

 having a number of tooth-like processes developed within the aper- 

 ture of the last whorl on arriving at maturity. The only country 

 in which this character again appears is in the centre of the old 

 world, among the smaller and more temperate species of Syria 

 and Hindoostan. In this part of Brazil we have also another 

 type, pecuhar to the locality, in which the last whorl is produced 

 in front into a longitudinally angled channel, as in B. goniostoma, 

 egregius, angulatus, fusiformis, &c. Upon the leaves of damp 

 underwood, at an elevation of about 2000 feet, is another distinct 

 and brilliantly coloured group, iJ. multicolor, Miersii, and the large 

 B. ovatus, which inhabits also the neighbouring island of St. Ca- 

 tharina. In the lower grounds upon orange-trees and in the 



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