546 BULLID^. 



BuIlcBa punctata, Philippi, Moll. Sicil. vol. ii. p. 95. 



BhUu {Philine) catena, A. Adams, Sow. Thesaur. Conch, vol. ii. p. 601, pi. 12.'). 

 f. 163. 



The shell is very small, barely composed of two coils, 

 extremely thin, of an uniform snow-white, and of a de- 

 pressed obliquely subovate figure, that is rounded at both 

 extremities, yet less so above, where, though narrower, it 

 is not distinctly retuse nor particularly contracted, than 

 below, where it becomes more ventricose and a little 

 dilated. The surface is adorned throughout by very 

 numerous chain-like somewhat divergently spiral raised 

 lines, the continuous links of which are sometimes round, 

 sometimes oval, sometimes still more transversely pro- 

 duced ; these series are very closely disposed, but are not 

 so broad as their intervals. The crown is neither umbili- 

 cated nor distinctly raised, but is obtuse, and exhibits a 

 single volution ; the sutural line is rather deep. The 

 aperture is very ample, filling nearly three quarters of 

 the ventral area ; it is of an obovate-subpyriform shape, 

 being only narrow for a brief space above, and much dilated 

 below, where its extremity is broadly but not bluntly 

 rounded. The outer lip, which is almost even with the 

 crown above, is only moderately arched, being chiefly pro- 

 minent towards the anterior extremity. The pillar lip is 

 broadly incurved, and neither reflected nor flanked by an 

 umbilical depression. Our largest examples only measure 

 a fifth of an inch in length, and an eighth of an inch in 

 breadth.* 



* Our Mediterranean specimens are somewhat larger, and have a slight recur- 

 vation of the pillar, so as to form an indistinct false umhilicus ; they approach 

 nearer to the sculpta of Searlcs Wood (Crag Moll. p. 120, pi. 21, f. 10) than do 

 our English examples. Montagu's variety of Buila catena (Test. Brit. p. 215, 

 copied in Turt. Conch. Diction, p. 24, and Fleming, Brit. Anim. p. 294) has not 

 been met with by us. lie thus describes it. "A variety with a more transpa- 



