58 
Benjamin Byunoe, Esq., to whom science is indebted for the discovery 
of many new and interesting objects in zoology. It is nearly allied 
to Halim. agilis, but in size is about equal to Halm. Thetis. ‘The fur 
is harsh and adpressed, and for the most part of a very pale brownish 
yellow tint; the back, however, is freely pencilled with black, the 
longer hairs having the exposed portion of this colour; a slight 
brownish grey hue is observable next the skin in the hairs of the back, 
but they are nearly uniform throughout their length, if we except a 
small black point to the shorter hairs, and the exposed black portion 
of the longer hairs ; the sides of the body and the limbs are of a paler 
hue, and are not pencilled with black; the abdomen may be de- 
scribed as of a dirty yellowish white colour; the tail is very nearly 
uniform in tint with the body, but a small portion at the apex is 
covered with brownish black hairs; the upper surface of the head 
is slightly tinted with brownish, and a mark of this colour runs from 
the eye to the tip of the snout on either side; adjoining this mark 
below is a pale mark; the ears have yellowish white hairs on the 
inner side, and rusty yellow hairs on the outer side; but along the 
anterior margin, and at the tip externally, the ears are black. The 
principal characters may be thus expressed :— 
Hatmaturvus Binok. Halm. corpore pallideé fuscescenti-flavo, supra 
nigro penicillato, subtis dilutiore ; caudd ad apicem fuscescenti- 
nigra; auribus externe ad apicem, margineque anticé, nigris. 
unc. lin. 
Longitudo ab apice rostri ad caudz basin.... 21 0 
ad basin auris .... 4 6 
— COULD kay hota tetuicyols (ec erraets iipis ei 20 O 
— tarsi digitorumque........+..+-- ee 
CUT BRIE cli Saad «fares op outyrigie Teale 2 3 
Hab. Port Essington. 
The following paper, by Mr. Lovell Reeve, entitled ‘‘ Monograph 
of the genus Tornatella, a small group of Pectinibranchiate Mollusks 
of the family Plicacea, including descriptions of seven new species, 
from the collection of H. Cuming, Esq.,” was then read. 
TornatTELua, Lamarck. 
Testa ovalis, cylindracea, plerumque transversim striata, rar0 leevis- 
sima, spira brevi, apice acuto; apertura longitudinali, superné 
angustata, inferne integra, rotundata; columella incrassata, valdé 
plicata ; labro simplici, solido, acuto. Molluscum marinum, pecti- 
nibranchiatum, operculo corneo, minuto, instructum. 
The very wide range of characters which were selected by Linnzeus 
for the determination of genera induced many inaccuracies in his 
method of classification which might certainly have been avoided, if, 
instead of generalizing upon the external variations of the shell, he 
had pursued a more searching inquiry, like his contemporaries 
Adanson and Forskael, into the nature of its animal inhabitant. 
His genus Voluta, for example, founded upon the character of the 
