ON MOLLUSCA OF THE WEST COAST OF NORTH AMERICA, 617 
Rep.p.350); and also, not being a place of trade, or even an inhabited district, 
likely to be free from human importations, although we should be prepared 
to find dead exotics thrown on its shores both by northern and by tropical 
currents. In his solitary and what would otherwise have been monotonous 
life, Mr. Xantus found full employment in assiduously collecting specimens 
in all available departments of natural history; having received ample in- 
structions, and the needful apparatus, from the Smithsonian Institution, 
The bulk of the shells at first received from him were worn beach speci- 
mens; but afterwards several species were preserved, with the animals, in 
alcohol. Mr. Xantus generously presented the first series of the molluscs to the 
Smithsonian Museum, reserving the second for his native land. The first 
available duplicates of the shells not occurring in the Reigen collection will 
be found in the British Museum or in the Cumingian eabinets*. Although the 
whole series would have found little favour in the eyes of a London dealer or 
a drawing-room collector, it proved a very interesting commentary on the 
Reigen and Adams Catalogues: it added about sixty t new forms to the accu- 
rately located species of the marine fauna, besides confirming many others, 
which rested previously on doubtful evidence ; and disproved the intermixture 
of northern species, which, from the map alone, had before been considered 
probable. 
The collection is not only essentially tropical, but contains a larger propor- 
tion of Central American and Panama species than are found in the Reigen 
Catalogue. This may partly be due to the accidents of station, and partly to 
this projecting southern peninsula striking the equatorial currents. It must 
also be remembered that the Reigen Catalogue embraces only the Liverpool 
division of his collection ; and that many more species may have existed in 
that portion of the Havre series which did not find its way to the London 
markets. Mr. Xantus also obtained individuals of identical species from 
Margarita Island, and a series containing living specimens of Purpura plano- 
sptra (only thrown up dead on the promontory), from Socorro Island, one of 
the Revilla-gigedo group. <A very few specimens of Haliotis and of Pacific 
shells may have been given to him by sailors or residents: they were not 
distinguished from his own series in opening the packages. The collection is 
not yet complete. In consequence of the French occupation of Mexico, it 
was with difficulty that Mr. Xantus himself “ran the blockade” at Manza- 
nello; and he was compelled to leave there thirty-one boxes of shells, alco- 
holies, &c., subject to the risks of war. 
The Polyzoa were placed in the hands of Mr, G. Busk for examination, 
and the alcoholics were intrusted to Dr. Alcock, the Curator of the Manches- 
ter Natural History Society. Neither of these gentlemen have as yet been 
* During the period that Mr. Xantus was out of employment, owing to the derange- 
ments of the war, a portion of the duplicates were offered for sale, and will be found in 
some of the principal collections. 
t The editor of a Californian newspaper, kindly forwarded by Mr. Pease, professes 
to “give entire’ a paper read by 8. Hubbard at a meeting of the Cal. Acad. N.S. on 
the collections of Mr. Xantus. The following extract, which is entirely destitute of foun- 
dation in fact, is a curious specimen of the tendency to extreme exaggeration, which seems 
indigenous to some dwellers in a vast country, and has now, it seems, invaded even an 
Academy of Nat. Sc., who, it is to be hoped for their credit, have not published the paper 
in their Proceedings :—‘ The Mol/usca are represented by over 5000 specimens, not yet 
considered.—Shel/s: P. P. Carpenter gave, after a hurried survey of the collection, 1700 
species last year ; but since then the collection has more than doubled. About half of the 
whole is pronounced by P. P. C. and Isaac Lea to be new.’ Dr. Lea did not see the 
collection, as it contained neither Unionids nor Melaniads. Of Mr. Hubbard’s “ more 
than 3400 species,’ besides “Mollusca,” not one in ten have been seen, 
