DREDGING ON THE COAST OF SHETLAND, 327 



Further Report on Shetland Dredgings. 

 By J. GwYN Jeffreys^ F.R.S. 



The dredging-expedition this year occupied nearly three months. A relation 

 lent me his yacht, and I had every reason to be satisfied with the master and 

 crew, who did all in their power to promote the object of the expedition. 

 The master had beeia my dredger on the last occasion ; and I this time en- 

 gaged in that capacity Archibald MclN^ab, of Inverary, who had formerly been 

 employed by the late Mr. Barlee and myself in dredging on the west coast of 

 Scotland and that part of Shetland which we now visited. McNab c\-idently 

 took a great interest in the work, and I cannot speak too highly of his conduct. 

 I had also extra hands to assist in dredging. Mr. Waller and Mr. Peach 

 were my companions ; and both most ably and zealously cooperated with me 

 in this last investigation of the marine invertebrate fauna of the Shetland 

 Isles. The cost of the expedition (exclusive of travelling and personal ex- 

 penses) was about ^220, towards which .£75 was granted by the Association, 



But the weather was, as usual, unpropitious. We found, to our disappoint- 

 ment, that in this year the beginning of May was fine, and that time we just 

 missed. The rest of May and all June were more or less stormy. The second 

 week in July was more favourable than any other part of the season. The 

 variability of the weather in this district is very great, and no year is aUke 

 in that respect. The fishermen say that they never could depend on any 

 particular month in previous years as the finest or best suited for their 

 work ; and they told me that this season was the worst they had experi- 

 enced for the last twenty years. However, we continued to get some 

 dredging (on an average one or two days in each week) ; and altogether we 

 were not unsuccessful, owing in a great measure to having so much time 

 at our disposal. The stations which we revisited this year, and made our 

 head-quarters, were the ^\Tialsey Skerries and Balta, both exceedingly well 

 adapted for the exploration of the eastern side of the Shetland sea-bed. It 

 would of course be desirable to explore also the western side, although that 

 has partially been done by Mr. McAndrew. Perhaps he, or some other zoolo- 

 gist, wUl at a future time complete this part of the investigation. 



The most interesting species of MoUusca obtained on this occasion were 

 Kellia cycladia, Trochus amabilis, Margarita ehgantula, Rissoa Sarsi, R. Jef- 

 fregai, Eidima stenostoma, Ceritliiopsis costidata, Nassa haliaeti, Mangelia niva- 

 lis, Cylichna alba, a new species of Amphisphyra (which I propose to call 

 expansa and will presently describe), Clio retusa, and C. infundibulum. The 

 JYassa haliiieti is described and figured in Hornes's valuable monograph on the 

 miocene shells of the Vienna Basin, under the name of Columbella corrugata, 

 Bonelli, who seems to have considered it the same as the Buccinum corruga- 

 tuni of Brocchi. I do not know Bonelli's work ; but the Buccinum corrugatum 

 of Brocchi (' Conchiologia fossile Subapennina,' tom. ii. p. 652, tab. 15. 

 fig. 16) is certainly not our shell. Brocchi refers his species to the 

 Buccinum stolatum of Renier, an Adriatic shell, which the latter mistook for 

 the species of that name described by Gmelin, and which is a native of Tran- 

 quebar. Our species does not belong to the genus Cithara of Schumacher, 

 as I had at first supposed ; but it is remarkably interesting as being identical 

 with a miocene species, which has not reappeared or been detected in the 

 pliocene formation, and therefore might naturally be supposed to have become 

 extinct. I lately took an opportunity of showing both the recent and fossil 

 shells to Mr. Henry Adams ; and his skilful and practised eye could not detect 

 any difference between them. 



