118 THE XAUTILUS. 



flavor and delicacy of the Port Lincoln mammoths are proverbial 

 in that land of luxuries. I mean, when they are cooked. Many 

 people eat them raw, cutting off pieces with a knife and fork. I 

 draw the line there. I was going to tell you about the Sydney 

 oysters, in New South Wales, on the other side of the Australian 

 Continent ; but I must refrain. The memories are too tender. As 

 Mr. Guppy said: "There are chords in the human heart." — 

 Edioard Wakefield in Once a Week. 



GENERAL NOTES. 



Shells in Pine Forests. — In " Some Notes on American Land 

 Shells," Prof. A. G. Wetherby states that "it is not worth while to 

 search under or about nine logs for snails . . . and such I have 

 ever observed to be the case in Tennesse, Kentuck}" and North 

 Carolina ; and the scarcity of land shells in forests almost or exclu- 

 sively pine, is a fact well known." This statement has been of espe- 

 cial interest to me, having collected mollusca in Switzerland for 

 years. There pine — especially fir — are the principal, and to a great 

 extent exclusive, components of the forests in the valleys, and to a 

 great percentage in the mountains, both Alps and Jura, and many 

 of these forests are rather rich in snails. I can state from remem- 

 brance that almost all the land mollusca living in forests at all are 

 found also in pine woods ; and on the very trunks, logs, etc. of the 

 same wood I collected Limax, Vitrina (as high as 8 feet from the 

 ground), Helix (personata, obvoluta, etc.), Buliminiis montaiius 

 sometimes higher than can be reached by the hand ; B. obscurus ; 

 Clausilia, diflTerent species, etc. — Dr. V. Sterki. 



Land Shells in Pine Woods. — As a supplement to Di-. Sterki's 

 observations, we must say that our collecting in pine districts both 

 North and South, has given the impression that Prof. Wetherby's 

 conclusion is correct as far as the Eastern U. S. is concerned. We 

 have always found land shells rare in pine woods. In the Catskill 

 Mts. where the writer collected during the past summer, the land 

 shells ascend only as far as deciduous trees grow, none being found 

 in the coniferous belt. — H. A. P. 



