Injiuencc of Becent Gales on Marine Forms of Life. 131 



of view of the numbers in which they occurred, they may be 

 set down as follows : — Bnccinv.m undahimi, Lutraria ellvptica, 

 Pecten 0]jcreidaris, Cyprina Islandica, Mytilus edidis^ and Car- 

 diuni echinatum. The number of Buccinum undatum was 

 very great. One could hardly have imagined the existence 

 of so many of this species in the Forth. In an area less than 

 three feet square I counted 256, and they were quite as 

 plentiful for about a mile along the coast in a line some feet 

 below that of high-water mark. In nineteen cases out of 

 every twenty the shell contained the dead animal, with the 

 anterior part of the body and the operculum hanging out 

 about half-an-inch in length. In like proportion the body 

 whorl, or first turn of the shell, was broken in the fashion 

 now shown by the specimens on the table. I have not seen 

 this part of the shore for more than ten days, but if it presents 

 the same appearance as when last seen, these large whelks 

 might, literally, be gathered in cart-loads. 



The condition of Lutraria ellipticct is in marked contrast 

 with that of Buccinum undatum. The former rarely occurs 

 attached to the shell. Only after considerable search, I 

 obtained two or three specimens in which animal and shell 

 were united. The vast majority of specimens were naked. 

 Indeed, comparatively few shells are to be seen, but the debris 

 on the shore, and every shore pool, contained the naked forms, 

 and especially the peculiar-looking elongated flattened tube 

 formed by the united siphons. I counted thirty of these in a 

 pool formed around one of the boulders, which occur in 

 great numbers at several parts of this shore. 



The other species named above are much fewer than the 

 two now specially noticed. Pecten ojjercularis, while well 

 represented by single shells, when compared with the re- 

 mains of the waved whelk, might be said to be few in 

 number. But it is very uncommon to find the broken shells 

 of this species with the dead animals attached scattered 

 along the shore. It is, moreover, far less common to meet 

 with the strong shell of Cyprina Islandica so shattered while 

 the animal clings to some of the fragments, as is seen in 

 the specimen now on the table. In very many cases the 

 common mussel, animal and shell, is met with in a like con- 



