138 TEST ACE A ATLANTIC A. 



Seissal, the Eibeira da Janella, and Porto Moniz ; and it like- 

 wise is found in the Ribeira de Sta. Luzia, the Curral dos 

 Eomeiros, and elsewhere, on the southern side, above Funchal. 



The nearest Canarian ally of the H. lentiginosa is the 

 H. torrefacta (wrongly regarded, as I cannot but think, by 

 Mousson, as a Patula), — which was detected by myself and Mr. 

 Lowe on dry and exposed rocks in the extreme north of Lan- 

 zarote. That species however is a little larger, and much more 

 conspicuously ornamented with irregular white transverse mark- 

 ings ; its ground-colour is of a deeper reddish-brown above, but 

 paler beneath ; its umbilicus is rather larger ; the upper and 

 lower margins of its peristome are more widely interrupted 

 across the body-volution ; and its entire surface is both differ- 

 ently sculptured and differently clothed, — the transverse costate 

 lines being finer, closer, and more regular (although minutely 

 undulated), and crossed, or decussated, by infinitesimal spiral 

 striae, whilst the coarse lacinias of the H. lentiginosa are re- 

 placed by excessively diminutive and short squamiform bristles. 



Helix stellaris. 



Helix stellaris, Loive, Ann. Nat. Hist. ix. (1852) 

 „ „ Pfeitf., Mon. Hel. iii. 123 (1853) 



„ „ Lowe, Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond. 180 (1854) 



„ lentiginosa, var. /3., Alb., Mai. Mad. 38. t. 9. f. 21, 



22 (1854) 

 „ stellaris, Paica, Mon. Moll. Mad. 34 (1867) 



Habitat Maderam; in aridis apricis subinferioribus, baud 

 longe ab urbe Funchalensi sitis, hinc inde sub lapidibus. 



The present insignificant little Helix is closely allied to the 

 H. lentiginosa, of which indeed it was treated by Dr. Albers as 

 a ' var. /3. minor.'' Nevertheless I am satisfied that it is per- 

 fectly distinct ; and it is surprising to me how a conchologist 

 like Albers should have come to the conclusion, that there was 

 nothing on which to separate it from that species except its 

 smaller size. ' Praeter magnitudinem,' says he, ' non diversa a 

 forma typica ' ; whereas, apart from its greatly reduced dimen- 

 sions, it is appreciably flatter and more carinated than the 

 II . lentiginosa (its spire being less exserted), its umbiHcus is 

 relatively larger, it has only 4^ (instead of 5^) volutions, its 

 aperture is rather more oblique and oval, and its transverse 

 costate lines are much less coarse and less evident, whilst, on 

 the contrary, its hair-like filaments, or laciniae, are proportion- 

 ately more developed, — being enlarged about the region of the 

 keel (when the specimens are fresh and unrubbed) into ragged 

 whitish rays, giving the entire shell a somewhat star-like 



