NOTES AND QUERIES. 29 
to draw them up the zigzag cliff path than remove them by any other mode 
of conveyance. They feed also on cuttles and squid; I have taken 
them myself with these, and hundreds are constantly taken on the long-lines 
with this bait, shot in deep water, by the Plymouth and Brixham fishermen. 
The whelk is also a favourite food, and on the coast of Lincolnshire, at 
Sutton-on-Sea, and elsewhere, short stakes are stuck into the clayey fore- 
shore, and a single hook fastened to each baited with a whelk. Skate 
are constantly taken. So stiff is the clay foreshore that the stakes remain 
a considerable time before they become uprooted by bad weather.—J. C. 
Witcooxs (Plymouth). 
MOLLUSCA. 
Varietal Nomenclature. — Under this heading, in the December 
number of ‘ The Zoologist * (pp. 485-6), there appear some criticisms, pur- 
porting to be in answer to certain remarks of mine concerning the 
inexpediency of naming varieties of Mollusca. It seems to me that a 
more apt illustration of the truth of my remarks could hardly have been 
penned, if intended. Almost at the outset an illustration is furnished to 
my objection that the creation of these varietal names is mischievous in 
encouraging “ too close an insistence on trivial and valueless minutiz, to the 
overlooking of the broader generalisations that underlie them.” The con- 
cluding sentences of my article entirely preclude the idea that by “ rufous 
type” I meant anything approaching a so-called “var. rufa.” “Type” 
was, of course, used as a convenient word implying “ group” or “class,” 
though not exactly synonymous with either. Unfortunately no room seems 
to be left for generalisations in the doctrines of the variety-making school, 
nor do they apparently recognise the fact with which every naturalist 
should be familiar, that these variations are not fixed quantities, but 
merge into each other and combine to any extent; hence a string of 
names has to be employed, as admitted by my critic, or, in a word, 
each individual specimen has to be described, since each differs from its 
fellow. Varietal-names are not given to human beings according to the 
colour of their eyes or the differences in their stature; nor, as a friend 
suggests, are cats divided into varieties according to the number, presence, 
or absence of rings on their tails. These are matters of individual descrip- 
tion, and should remain as such, in snails as in other things. This, though 
he fails to perceive it, is the tendency of Mr. Cockerell’s system of nomen- 
clature, if such it can be called; ‘‘ major-depressa, tenuis-efasciata, &e.,” are 
descriptions, not names. For convenience, specialists might employ abbre- 
viations of well-known terms (and, as a matter of course, by preference of 
Latin origin), placed in brackets after the specific name, to denote such 
departures from the type as might be worth chronicling. Thus alb. would 
stand for all white specimens of a usually coloured shell; Ayal. for trans- 
pareut ones; ten. for extra thin but uot transparent, preten. for very 
