210 BULLETIN OF THE 



a generic name which had been used for a fish some time previously by Bona- 

 parte. For reasons already stated, I refer the species provisionally to Aspella. 



Aspella hastula has exactly such a surface as this shell, and so when perfect 

 does A. anceps. The nucleus of A. hastula is precisely that of A. scalarioides. 

 I have not seen any specimen of anceps which retains the nucleus. But the 

 more perfect the specimens, the nearer their general character agrees with that 

 of hastula and scalarioides, though I admit that the commonly worn and defect- 

 ive beach specimens of anceps would usually convey a different impression. 



Murex erosus Broderip has been compared with this species, and much re- 

 sembles M. intermedius C. B. Adams. Both belong to the group which follows. 

 It is destitute of an external cretaceous layer, and has a different operculum. 



In the Jeffreys collection I find a " Murex distinctus var. acantJwpferus," 

 labelled by Monterosato. This shell is a young and slender whitish specimen 

 of a Muricidea, like Al. hexagona. I have not seen it referred to elsewhere, 

 and the name may be a manuscript one. 



Genus OCINEBRA Leach. 



There does not seem to be any good reason why this name should be mis- 

 spelled, as it is so often, and as I find it in the " Mollusques Marins du Roussil- 

 lon," for example ; but it probably arises from the fact that it is easier to look 

 at Dr. Gray's P. Z. S. list of genera of 1847, than it is to correct the numerous 

 errors contained in that list by going to the original authority. 



There are several species on our coasts which belong to this group if we 

 regard the shell only ; but in 0. erinacea the operculum is that of typical 

 Murex, anterior but not apical, and somewhat laterally situated. In the 

 American species the nucleus is apical, and I suppose them to bear somewhat 

 such a relation to Ocinebra proper as Boreotrophon Fischer does to the typical 

 Trophon. I have not been able to examine the operculum of Murex breviculus 

 Sowerby, to which the name of Favartia was applied in 1880, according to 

 Fischer. 



But the shell of M. breviculus has so many points in common with that of 

 our little Ocinebras, that I suspect it belongs to the same group, which would, 

 in that case, form a subgenus of Ocinebra rather than of Phyllonotus. 



For the present I shall adopt the name referred to for the shells in question. 



Subgenus FAVARTIA Fischer. 

 Favartia cellulosa Conradc 



Plate XVI. Fiff. 1. 



Murex cellulosa Conrad, Proc. Pliil. Acad. Nat. Sci., III. p. 25, 1846. 

 Murex nuceus Morch, Cat. Kierulf, p. 14, no. 343, pi. i. fig. 9, 1850. 

 Ocenebra nuceus Morch, Cat. Yoldi, p. 95, 1852. 



Habitat. Coast of the United States from the vicinity of Cape Fear, N. C , 



