S A X 1 F R A GE A S C A LLO P SHELL. 



611 



are of small size, and they pass so rapidly that they 

 could hardly be taken by the swallows and - 

 These flv rapidly, no doubt, but some time elapses 

 before their long wings can get the proper momentum. 

 Hence they are fit for such places only as abound 

 with aerial prey. The most vigorous of them would 

 be worn out before they could make half a meal ; 

 aud therefore there ;r the winged insects 



of these places birds which hare keen eyes, can get 

 readily on the win?, fly rapidly for a short time, and 

 fly in every directio: . -: are characters of the 



chats, and there are no birds in the class better suited 

 to their places. 



. XIFRAGE-E. A natural order comp 

 _enera and one hundred and forty-two s: 

 chiedy alpine herbs. Their leaves are opposite or 

 alternate, in general, simple, and without stipules, 

 but occasionally compound, and furnished with inter- 

 petiolar stipules ; the calyx consists of five sepals, 

 more or less connate, and joined to the germen ; the 

 germen is sometimes inferior, sometimes half-inferior, 

 and sometimes free ; the petals are equal in number 

 to the se ed from the tube of the calyx, 



and alternate with the lobes ; the stamens are peri- 

 -oceedine from the calyx ; the filaments 

 are a \vlshaped, and the anthers ovate and two-celled, 

 opening by pores or chinks ; the germen consists of 

 two carpels ; the styles equal (o the carpels and per- 

 sistent ; the stigmas clubbed. The fruit is a two- 

 valved capsule, opening either from the base or 

 apex. 



Sturifraga is a very extensive srenus, and various 

 attempts have been made to break it up into several 

 genera, but their atr. close, and the grada- 



tions so complete, that it seems preferable to consider 

 .:tf them only as subgeneric groups. The eenera 

 included in this order are the follow in? : viz.. Saxi- 

 frage, Heuchera, TlareUa, Astiibe, Jhfifcjfa. TeUma, 

 C'hrusospleiuHnt, Ac'oxa. Hydrangea, and Gala*. 



. :\ extensive genus of 



annual and perennial herbs, found in all parts of the 

 old world. The flowers are tetrandrous. -and the genus 

 ranks among the Dipsacete. A few of them are Bri- 

 -: Indian annual sons are ad- 

 mitted into our flower gardens ; and the African sorts 

 ;bby. 



\ (Dr. Brown). A genus of under- 



shrubs from the East and \Vest Indies, and herbaceous 



nials from New Holland. They belong to the 



Peatandna, and to the natural order Goodatoviee. 



Thestovespeci- - t :newhat succulent, must not 



be over-watered : both these and the greenhouse sorts 



'pagated by cuttings. 



narck ; TCRBO SCALARIS, Lin- 



ilusc has been commonly called the 



etrap, a corruption from the German word 



npe, a winding staircase. At one period 



nples of it were extremely rare, and 



reduced a higher price, the enormous 



sum of one hundred guineas having been given for a 



men, which, at the present time, would find no 



purchaser at as many shillings. The writer of this 



e has had an c of seeing numbers of 



these shells, many of which were sold at high prices, 



but no one produced more than fifteen guineas. This 



shell is now by no mean* rare of an ordin 



oeeds two and a half inches, but when it 

 reaches three and. a half, il - rare occurrence, 



and still bears a price out of all proportion to the 



smaller specimens. -Linnaeus, in this instance, exhi- 

 bited that want of observation and correct judgment 

 which so frequently marks the generic arrangement 

 of his conchological system ; he classed this mollusc 

 with the genus Turbo, and subsequent writers have 

 blended it with the modern genus CytJattoma ; it has, 

 in fact, a circular aperture, but its habitat is different, 

 and its turreted form unlike that genus ; another 

 distinguishing distinction is the longitudinal elevated 

 ribs, which are never connected together entirely ; 

 these ribs are only the thin reflected margins of pre- 

 tenninations of the aperture, each one exhibit- 

 ing the growth and addition made to the shell by its 

 inhabitant at successive periods of enlargement, 

 and these would, if it were possible to mark them 

 from time to time in their native element, demon- 

 strate the age of the shell, a circumstance now in- 

 volved in the greatest obscurity, and merely a matter 

 of conjecture, no parity of reasoning bearing upon 

 that point with any degree of satisfactory conclusion. 

 The Scalarite are marine shells, their spire is' more 

 or less elongated in the different species, but in all 

 the succeeding whorl is always larger than the pre- 

 ceding, which occasions the turreted form of. these 

 shells to differ from the cylindrical shape of the pupa, 

 to which in some other respects they may be 

 said to possess a resemblance, particularly in having 

 numerous ribs on the whorls. The aperture of the 

 Scalana is round or nearly so, sometimes a little more 

 depressed on the inner than the outer side ; the edge 

 of it is thickened, sharp, and outwardly reflected at 

 right angles, and there appears a very slight indica- 

 tion of a groove or canal on the columelia side not 

 mentioned by Lamarck or other writers ; they pos- 

 sess an operculnm, but it is extremely uncommon to 

 meet with it, as the animal is rarely imported with its 

 shell. The Scalana prctiota, which, from its name, 

 implies its estimation ngular for its umbi- 



licus and the separation of its spiral whorls, which 

 appear like an attenuated tube spirally evolved 

 round a cone. The whorls are drawn out, and some 

 examples have been met with in which the whorls 

 do not touch each other in any sense. They are, 

 however, ordinarily touching or connected together 

 by the longitudinal ribs formed of the previous ter- 

 minations of the aperture. Several species are known, 

 both recent and fossil, but their distinctions are none 

 of them so marked with each other as the Scalar* 

 prrbasa is with them. In such examples as present 

 the whorls totally unconnected with each other, the 

 so called ribs not being in any way essential to their 

 support, an alliance may be traced to the genus 

 I'erviehu, but the animal differs in many respect- 

 - - : al. the foot short, oval, and inserted beneath the 

 neck ; there are two tentacube terminated by a 

 thread earning the eyes at the extremity of 'the 

 larger end. The Chinese and Japanese seas pro- 

 duce the rare species we have above described ; hot 

 the Seaiaris eommtnut is abundantly found on our own 

 coast, and in other northern latitudes. The late Dr. 

 Leach named that species whose whorls are totally 

 disjunct JryojMa, but we rather view such an occur- 

 rence as a* sport of nature, than caused by any spe- 

 cific distinction, similar loss being observable hi 

 many other mollusca, and even in the genus Hfiir, 

 though they are extremely uncommon. 



SHELL n the familiar name of the 

 Ostrra marina of Linnsens, the Peden mejrimiu of 

 Lamarck. Under its English name-it is so well 



