PLATE LXXIX. 



summer months of 1800, was taken in a moat near Portsmouth, 

 by J. Laskey, Esq. of Crcditon, who favoured us with some 

 particulars respe(5ting the animal inhabiting it. In a young state, 

 he says, it has the appearance of a winged insect, and sports in 

 its watery element with all the liveliness of a butterfly, and formed 

 a pleasing object when kept alive in a glass of sea water. It 

 seems to prefer little pools, or still waters within reach of the 

 tide, to more exposed situations. 



In general the specimens that have been found at Portsmouth 

 are very small, the shell from which the upper figure is copied 

 far exceeding the others in size. This species, though ver^' ihin 

 and brittle, is yet so elastic as to bear much compression with- 

 out injury, and in this respect differs from every other British species 

 of Bulla already known. Amongst the foreign kinds arc several 

 elastic kinds ; and this very species is found of a much larger 

 size in the Mediterranean Sea. — Independent of its elasticity, the 

 convoluted apex is a material rlmractcr of this shell, considered 

 as a Britisli species. 



