Fusus. 427 



has three or four whorls, and is fully four lines in length. 

 They ultimately make their escape by a dissolution or 

 rupture of the cells, for there is no aperture in the inner 

 coat, and the slip in the outer one seems intended merely 

 to admit the water necessary to their covering. 



The animal is white, or yellowish-white ; its head is 

 rather broad, its tentacula flattened and broad- band, the 

 eyes small. The siphonal tube is marked with black 

 specks, and in few are sometimes present in the head. 

 The foot is ample, and below is of a deeper yellowish 

 colour than the body. 



The axile denticles of the tongue are broadly oblong and 

 three-toothed below, the laterals have two or three large 

 serrations on their peduncles below. 



The shell, according to Dr. Fleming, is used by the 

 Zetlander as a lamp, and forms a by no means inelegant 

 one, as its outline is exceedingly graceful. 



The Fusus aniiquus has a range of from five to thirty 

 fathoms, living on various kinds of ground, but preferring 

 shell banks. It is very rare on our southern shores, but 

 becomes common as we go north, and in some parts of the 

 Irish sea is a very abundant shell. Of its varieties, the 

 subcarinated form is taken in abundance off the south-east 

 of Ireland, as at Dungarvan (Dr. Farran). On the Manx 

 coast, a small yellow-mouthed variety is most abundant. 

 Mr. G. B. Sowerby procured a reversed specimen from off 

 the mouth of the Thames, and also a scalariform mon- 

 strosity, both of which are in Mr. Jeifreys' magnificent 

 collection. The range of this species is, typically, boreal 

 and arctic. 



