SMITH : ON THE GENERIC NAME OF ALLIED SPECIES. 14T 



this shell the name of its discoverer, Miss Ida Shepherd, whose 

 indefatigable exertions in collecting the mollusca of her country have 

 been crowned with so much success, and are so much appreciated 

 by American and other Conchologists. 



ON THE GENERIC NAME TO BE APPLIED TO 



THE NERITA AURITA OF MULLER AND 



OTHER ALLIED SPECIES. 



By EDGAR A. SMITH, F.Z.S., 



Zoological Department, British Museum, London. 



In his monograph of the famiiy Melaniidic, Dr. Brot has arranged 

 a certain number of species under the genus Claviger, which was 

 proposed by Prof. Haldeman 1 for Melania aurita (Muller) and 

 M. tuberculata, Rang. He rejects the generic name Vibex, which 

 has been used by some authors, and was published by Oken in 

 18 15, on the ground that it had a different scope. Vibex was 

 adopted by Gray in 1840, 1841, and 1S42 in the different editions 

 of the " Synopsis of the contents of the British Museum" where it 

 appears merely in the systematic list of genera of Mollusca, so it is 

 impossible to know what he included in it. In his " List of Genera 

 of recent Mollusca"' 1 judging from the species quoted, his Vibex 

 evidently is equivalent to Claviger. The name Vibex, according to 

 Scudder/' was also employed in the year 18 15 by Rafmesque 4 for 

 another group of mollusca. Mr. Sykes has kindly consulted for 

 me the work in which Rafinesque has described his genus, and 

 it appears that it was founded for a group of the family Cassididce. 



The object of the present paper is to point out that neither of 

 the names Vibex or Claviger can be retained for this group of 

 Meldnians. According to Phillippr' the genus Vibex was created 

 by Oken for the reception of the Strombus jluviatilis of Rumph. 

 This species is figured by the latter author in his " Amboinische 

 Rarita kit-hammer," pi. xxx., fig. P., and described on p. ior. It is 

 a long, slender, smooth shell, of the same type as M. haslula, Lea. 



'American Journ. Sci. and Arts, 1842, vol. xlii., p. 216. 



- Proc. Zool. Soc, 1S47, p. 153, No. 221. 



3 Nomenclator Zool., p. 351. * Anal, de la Nature, p. 145, (1S15). 



fi Handbuch Conch, und Mai., p. 498. 



