130 TELLINIDJE. 



the ovary anterior, running to the lower part of the body, is 

 at this season (July) full of white ova in various stages of 

 maturation. The stylet and stomachal attritor are present ; 

 indeed we believe that they may be found in every bivalve. 



These notes, with those on T. solidula, suggest the query, 

 ought not the two, and any other of similar branchial struc- 

 ture, to be removed from the typical Telling, to a distinct 

 Tellinidan genus ? The singular character of the single com- 

 pound branchial plate on each side, their oblique, almost 

 vertical position, together with the form, disposition and 

 enormous size of the two pair of triangular palpi, so entirely 

 different in the Tellina of the first section, would appear to 

 sanction such a procedure. 



T. SOLIDULA, Pulteney. 

 T. solidula, Brit. Moll. i. p. 304, pi. 20. f. 6. 



Animal suboval, thick ; mantle of strong and firm texture, 

 tumid at the margins, which have a fine short lead-coloured 

 fringe, closed posteriorly, and forming two very long hyaline 

 siphons ; the anal one turns upward, and is often exserted to 

 almost twice the length of the shell, plain at the orifice ; the 

 branchial is usually less extended, and has 46 very minute 

 dentations at the aperture ; in the protrusion of the tubes the 

 animal is very capricious, often exserting the branchial far 

 beyond the anal one and vice versa, which has led authors into 

 descriptive mistakes. The siphons are disunited from their 

 bases. The foot is white, very large, thick and fleshy, of a 

 lanceolate shape, but not very long and pointed, geniculated, 

 and without byssal groove. The branchial apparatus is cu- 

 rious, and a departure from the Tellina type ; it consists of a 

 single rather elongated branchial plate, on each side, situated 

 towards the posterior half of the animal ; it is fixed to the 

 dorsal range by its base running obliquely, indeed almost 

 vertically from the dorsal to the ventral range, becoming 

 joined to its fellow under the posterior and smaller part of the 

 body, by a permanent membrane. The whole area of the 

 plate is well fixed, the two sides being scarcely free at the 



