MUSEUM OF COMPAKATIVE ZOOLOGY. 135 



valve, is a faint flexuosity ; right valve the smaller ; basal and anterior cardi- 

 nal borders nearly parallel, posterior cardinal border rather steeply sloping to 

 the end of the rostrum ; anterior end rounded, basal margin nearly straight. 

 Lon. from anterior end to beak, 7.0 ; to tip of rostrum, 10.5 ; alt. 5.5 mm.; 

 diam. 3.75 mm. approximately. 



Yucatan Strait, (340 fms. 



This lovely little species is one of the instances of remarkably fine color in a 

 deep-water shell. It somewhat resembles a miniature Tellina Tayloriana Sow- 

 erby (Conch. Icon. Tellina, PI. XXX. fig. 168, 1867), but the sculpture is 

 greatly finer, the color purer, and the form not so broad ; Tellina tenuilirata 

 Sowerby, from New South Wales (loc. cit, PI. XXXIX. fig. 219), is still more 

 like it, but is shorter and broader proportionally. 



Loripes compressa n. s. 



Shell thin, elongated, with squarish bluntly rounded ends, the base and 

 hinge-line nearly parallel, much compressed, dull white, nearly smooth but 

 not polished ; hinge with a single small but distinct cardinal tooth in the 

 right valve, entering a triangular depression in the opposite valve, otherwise 

 edentulous ; beaks inconspicuous nearest the anterior end ; anterior hinge-mar- 

 gin straight, a little sloping ; posterior ditto short, excavated ; ends equally 

 bluntly rounded ; base evenly arcuated ; interior polished, white, margin 

 smooth ; exterior with some malleated irregularities, generally only sculp- 

 tured by the more or less accentuated lines of growth, which are produced at 

 the hinge-margin into small triangular denticulations and in some specimens 

 rise to extremely thin distant delicate lamelhe on the body of the valves ; sur- 

 face without radiating strise, and covered with a pale yellowish epidermis. 

 Lon. 11.0 ; alt. 8.3 ; diam. 2.75 mm.; another broken specimen exceeds 15 

 mm. in length. 



Off Cape San Antonio, in 413 and 424 fms. 



This shell is nearest Loripes anatinelloides Reeve, which is larger, much more 

 orbicular, more waved before and behind, and has a different sculpture with 

 radiating striae. It also recalls Lucina (Myrtea) spinifera, but has no lateral 

 teeth, is more quadrangular, much more compressed, and less prominently 

 sculptured. 



Loripes icterica Reeve. 



Lucina ictcrica Reeve, Coneh. Ieon. Lucina, PI. X. figs. 60 a, b, Aug. 1S50. 



Station 21, 287 fms.; Yucatan Strait, 640 fms. 



This shell is quite closely related to L. lactea or kucoma. 



