NO. 2238. NOMENCLATURE OF THE FAMILY TURRIT I DAE— BALL. 317 



from a nomenclatorial standpoint, may without too much repre- 

 hension be accepted. 



Genus DRILLIA Gray, 1838. 



The name Drlllia was proposed in 1838 for a peculiar African 

 species {umhilicata Gray) by J. E. Gray. What is probably the 

 same species Brachytoma castanea Swainson, 1840, was one of the 

 two types of Swainson's Brachytoma (not Brachystoma^ as mispelled 

 by several authors) and both of them probably may turn out to be 

 Clavatulae. At any rate the shells which have been commonly called 

 Drillia have to take another name. 



The small blackish Drillias so common in Panamic waters, of which 

 Pleurotoma hottae Valenciennes is the type, will take the name of 

 Crassispira Swainson, 1840. 



The light-colored species, with an oily gloss, thin shells, and prom- 

 inent riblets usually crossed by rather widely spaced spiral striations, 

 will take the new name of Elaeocyma Dall. This group appears to 

 be peculiar to the Pacific coast of America. Drillia empyrosia Dall 

 may be taken as type and D. unimaculata Sowerby, hempMlli Stearns, 

 and several others belong to it. 



Cymatosyrinx Dall, 1889, based on Pleurotoma lunata Lea, will 

 cover the thin-shelled light-colored species of its type. 



For the generally brown or brownish clathrate species a few of 

 which are found in nearly every fauna, and of which Pleurotoma 

 gihhosa Reeve may be specified as a typical example, the new name 

 of ClatJirodrillia Dall may be used. Drillia ostrearum Stearns is 

 an American example. 



Genus MELATOMA Swainson, 1840. 



Swainson in 1840 described and figured under the name of Mela- 

 toma costata a shell which he supposed to be fluviatile but which 

 really belonged to the Turritidae. Seven years later Gray gave the 

 name of CUonella {sinuatum Born) to a species of the same concho- 

 logical type. This group which by its dentition and operculum is 

 related to the Clavatulae must take the earlier name. 



There is a group of species typified by Pleurotoma penicillata Car- 

 penter which in sculpture and periostracum closely resemble the 

 African Melatoma^ but their operculum has an apical nucleus and is 

 long and narrow. They may be called Pseudomelatoma. Melatoma 

 Anthony, 1847, is quite a different thing. 



Genus MONILIOPSIS Conrad, 1865. 



This name was applied in 1865 to a very beautifully sculptured 

 species {M. eldborata Conrad) from the Eocene. The West American 



