8 



RANDOM NOTES ON NATURAL HISTORY. 



profusion, that the shore is not a place to 

 be avoided rather than sought, but such is 

 the fact. There are vast quantities of 

 decaying vegetable and animal matter lying 

 on the shore and at the bottom of the bay, 

 which, if left to itself, would poison the air 

 and water and render it impossible to live 

 near it ; but as among birds we have the 

 vulture, and among beasts the jackall, so in 

 the ocean we have among molluscs the 

 cannibal snail, Ilyanassa obsoleta, which in- 

 discriminately devours every dead object, 

 and even attacks the inoffensive clam as it 

 lies at high tide, with its foot extended, and 

 with one sweep of its tongue, tears off by 

 the denticles with which it is covered, a 

 piece of the living flesh and devours it. 

 The dead shells of this species are the 

 favorite abode of the Hermit Crab, Pagurus 

 longicarpus. Nine-tenths of the shells 

 brought up by the dredge are of this species, 

 each containing a living crab. 



The ova capsules are laid in April and 

 May, of a transparent corneous texture, at- 

 tached to the inside surface of a valve of 

 Venus or M3'a, or on the inner face of the 

 vidus of Natica ; they are deposited in vast 

 numbers, and completel}' cover the object 

 to which they are attached. 



The three species described above : Vibex, 

 trivittata, and obsoleta, were all described 

 by Say under the generic name of Nassa, in 

 1822, Journal Acad. Nat. Sci., Vol. 2, pp. 

 231 and 232. 



Family 6. Turbinellidae, consisting of 

 two genera, Turbinella with four species, 

 and Vasum with seven, is not found nearer 

 than the West Indies. 



Family 7. Volutidae, a large family of 

 showy, fine and conspicuous shells, some of 

 them rare and expensive. There are five 

 genera, sixteen sub-genera, and about one 

 hundred living, and two hundred and fifty 

 or more fossil species, none of which inhabit 

 the United States, excepting Voluta (Au- 

 Kca) junonia, Chemn., which inhabits the 

 deep water off Florida. This is a rare and 

 highly prized shell, specimens of which 

 have been sold as high as two hundred 

 dollars. Messrs. Southwick & Jencks have 

 specimens on sale which can be bought for 

 ten dollars each. 



Family 8. Mitridse, contains eight genera 

 and over five hundred species, all of which 

 are foreign to our fauna. 



Family 9. Marginellidae : two genera, 



nine sub-genera, and two hundred and 

 seventeen species, all tropical and sub- 

 tropical, and seventy- five fossil species. 



Family 10. Olividse, with three sub- 

 families, four genera, ten sub-genera, and 

 one hundred and twelve species, all absent 

 from our fauna. 



Family 11. Columbellidse, contains four 

 recent genera and two fossil, fourteen sub- 

 genera, and about three hundred and fifty 

 species, of which six inhabit New England, 

 descriptions of which will be given in the 

 next chapter. 



{To be continued.) 



ORGYIA LEUCOSTIGMA 



In Providence and vicinit}', for the past 

 two years, about July 20, a handsome cater- 

 pillar has appeared. Length one-half to one 

 inch and a quarter ; back black on the first 

 half with four thick white or yellow tufts, 

 the last half black with two small red tufts, 

 and striped on each side with yellow, sides 

 gray, head red, under parts yellow white, 

 two long loose pencils of black or brown 

 hairs extend forward over its head, and one 

 of loose brown hairs backward from the 

 tail. They infest particularly the elms and 

 lindens. The English Sparrows do not 

 touch them, and they promise to multiply. 

 After a time a white silken cocoon is spun 

 loosel}' in the crevices of the bark, enclos- 

 ing a dark brown pupa about one half an 

 inch long, and this should be destroyed, as 

 in a short while, having undergone transfor- 

 mation, a male moth (according to Packard 

 brown with a lunate white spot near the 

 outer angle of the wings) , will issue, or else a 

 wingless female, creamy or dirty white in 

 color, and hardly to be noticed as she sits 

 on the old cocoon, where she is quickl}' 

 sought out b}- the male. Directl}' she lays 

 in the same place a mass of white eggs, 

 that to the eye look like a white crust, or 

 the dried and somewhat glistening white of 

 a hen's egg ; these in turn hatch out the 

 cate'rpillar. 



The whole affair is so simple, the cater- 

 pillar so prominent, and the female moth 

 so defenceless and local in her habits, that 

 a very little time and labor applied to the 

 killing of the handsome caterpillar, and the 

 scraping down the cocoons at any and all 

 seasons, must result in much good. 



I 



