47 MARSHALL : ON THE BRITISH SPECIES OF BUCCINUM, FUSUS, ETC. 



I incline to the opinion of Canon Norman, that this is " a large 

 variety of F. propinqimx.'' It is not only larger generally, but is much 

 more solid and robust, and commences where the latter leaves off, viz. 

 in the Bristol Channel, F. propinquus iendmg north, and F. jefreysianus 

 to the south. Its British range is from Exmouth in South Devon 

 (Clark) to both sides of St. George's Channel as far as the Smalls 

 Lighthouse oft the Pembrokeshire coast, which is its northernmost limit, 

 meeting here and mingling with F. 'pi'opiiKpmx, and so partaking some- 

 what of each other's characteristics. From a series of specimens from 

 this district it is not difficult to graduate one form into the other, or to 

 meet with examples that may be asscribed to either. Moreover, none 

 of the characters ascribed to it by Jeffreys mark it off as a distinct 

 species. The comparative length of the spire is too variable to make 

 it a specific test, and as to that of the smooth epidermis, Gwyn Jeffreys 

 would probably now qualify his description after admitting that F. saJnni, 

 F.pUipixceus, F.jrropinquus, and Jhircimiiii tjrd'nlandiruin are occasionally 

 "finely and closely ciliated, though the epidermis is usually smooth," for 

 some F. jefreysianus are certainly hispid even to the unaided eye. 

 It it quite true that the young arid fry " are as distinct from those of 

 F. propimiuiis as the adult of each from the other," but neither is that 

 a specific test. (It is curious, by the way, that the shape of the young 

 are the reverse to the adult shell, those of F. Jt^ffreysianus being long 

 and narrow, while those of F. propinquus are short and stumpy.) I'he 

 shell becomes larger and more solid as it proceeds south, and attains 

 its greatest development in Torbay and at Exmouth, my largest thence 

 being 2f-in. by i^-in., while the smallest, from the south of Ireland and 

 the Pembrokeshire coast, are if -in. by f-in. All the published figures 

 correctly represent the shell, the best perhaps being those of Captain 

 Thomas Brown, (^) who was the first to figure it, though mistakenly 

 as the last species. His description, however, is unreliable, and he 

 says a specimen was "found at Seaton, Northumberland, by A\'alter 

 Trevelyan, Esq., and in the cabinet of Sir John Trevelyan at W'alling- 

 ton;" but the figures are undoubtedly those of F. jejfreysianus, and of 

 the South Devon form. Sir Walter may without doubt have picked 

 up a specimen of F. propiiviuus at Seaton, but that cannot be the shell 

 figured by Brown, and it is surprising to find Gwyn Jeffreys and others 

 failing to recognise the figures. Sowerby figures the Irish form well. 



F. BERNiciENSis, King. — Aberdeenshire (Simpson and others)! 

 Channel slope 539 f. ("Porcupine"); Atlantic off Ireland 345 f. (R.I. A. 

 cruise) ; Shetland Faroe Channel 570 f. ("Triton"). The finest came 



(i) Illust. Rec. Shells, 2nd ed., 1845, p. 8, pi. vi, figs. 11, 12. 



