40 rUOCEEDINGS OF THE JIALACOLOO TCAL SOCIETY. 



ON A COLLECTIOX OF SLUGS FROM TEE SAXD^YICII ISLANDS. 

 By Walter E. Collinge, F.Z.S., 



Assistant Lecturer and Demonstrator in Zoology and Comparative 

 Anatomy, Mason College, Birmingham. 



Read \Wi Januarij, 1896. 



ThrouCxH the kindness of Mr. E. E,. Sykes, I have been permitted to 

 make an examination of the slags collected by Mr. II. C. L. Perkins 

 in the Sandvs^ich Islands for a Joint Committee of the Royal Society 

 and British Association. Some of the material has been hardened in 

 a solution of corrosive sublimate, which has made dissection some- 

 what difficult. I have, however, been able to make out fairly well the 

 chief features of the alimentary and reproductive organs. 



I am also greatly indebted to Mr. Sykes for the assistance he has 

 rendered me with respect to the bibliography ; whilst to Professor 

 Cockerell I must express my thanks for directing my attention to 

 a species of Janelln, said to have come from the Sandwich Islands. 



The first mention of the slug-fauna of the Sandwich Islands is that 

 by Eydoux and Souleyet, in their account of the molluscan fauna of 

 this region in 1852-3. They there describe a new species, Li max 

 Sandwtchiensis, and figure the animal and shell. Their description 

 is as follows : — 



^'■Limax SandwicliicnKis, nohis, pi. xxviii, figs. 8-11. — Limax, corpore 

 elevate, postice acuminato, obli(|ue striate, supra nigricaute, subtus 

 albido ; clypeo oblongo, antice angusto, subrugosa. Ossiculo ovato, 

 crasso, supra gibboso." 



Semper (11) in a foot-note to his description of Limax tennellus, 

 Miss., says that there is a species — Limax Sandwichiensis — exceedingly 

 like L. tennellus, but somewhat smaller, which occurs in the Sandwich 

 Isles. In external appearance and in the form of the reproductive 

 organs, the two are in complete harmony. The only difi^erences he 

 found were some minor ones in the teeth of the lingual ribbon, and 

 to these he was inclined to attach but little importance. Semper 

 seems to have had but little doubt that the Limax he examined was 

 identical with L. tennellus, Nilss. Unfortunately he makes no mention 

 of the shell. 



It was pointed out by Tryon (14) that in the figure of the shell of 

 Limax Sandwichiensis, there was a central nucleus, like a Patella. 

 "With some reserve, on account of the insufficient description, he placed 

 this species in the genus Amalia. 



Heynemann (7) records from the Sandwich Islands an Agriolimax 

 Sandwiclnensis (Souleyet), which be thought to be near Aqr. Icevis. 



\¥hether the slugs examined by Semper and Heynemann were the 

 same as those collected by Eydoux and Souleyet, it is impossible to 

 say. Neither Semper nor Heynemann, one would suppose, could over- 

 look the very peculiar shell. 



