TRANSACTIONS OF WAGNER 

 1040 



TERTIARY FAUNA OF FLORIDA 



Liiiricola Cpr., Suppl. Rep. Brit. As., p. 639, 1863; sole ex. L. alta Conr. Not Lutrkola 

 Blainv., Man. Mai., i., p. 566, 1825 {^Thracia + Scrohicularia + Eastonia). 



Metis H. and A. Adams, Gen. Rec. Moll., ii., p. 399 (sole ex. T. Meyeri Phil.) + Capsa 

 H. and A. Adams, op. cit., p. 409, 1856; not Capsa Leach, Moll. Gt. Brit., p. 298, 

 1852, = Venerupis; nor Tryon, Cat. Tell., p. gg, 1869, = Macalia Adams. 



The generic name Capsa has been more ill used than almost any other in 

 our nomenclature. The first use of it probably was by Humphrey in May, 

 1797, for a fresh-water shell from New South Wales said to be the Venus 

 erosa of Solander in the Portland Catalogue (No. 3961). A manuscript note 

 by Morch in his copy of Humphrey states that this was Cyrena Keraiidreni, 

 but neither the species nor the genus was described in either the Calonne or 

 the Portland Catalogue. The volume of the plates of the Encyclopedic 

 Methodique, in which plate 231 appears, has the date 1797 on its title-page, 

 and no text appeared until 1827 owing to the death of Bruguiere. There are 

 no specific names on the plates, only the generic name above the neat-line of 

 the engraving. Three types are represented on the plate labelled Capsa. 

 Figure i may perhaps be a Metis, but is represented with an entire pallial line. 

 Figure 2 is Tellina Bruguieri Hanley, 1846, for which H. Adams in i860 pro- 

 posed the generic name of Macalia (not, as indicated by Fischer, Man., p. 

 1 150, typified by Macoma inquinata Desh.). Figures 3 and 4 are species of 

 Asaphis (Modeer, 1793). If Humphrey's name is the earliest, it is indeter- 

 minable and must be dropped from nomenclature. If Bruguiere came first, 

 then the type of Capsa must be either Tellina Bruguieri, which was adopted 

 by Tryon in 1869, or the indeterminable possible Metis at the top of the plate, 

 since the type must, according to modern rules, be takein from among those 

 species associated with a generic name by its author at the time of its first 

 publication. Lamarck named Tellina angulata L. as his sole example of Capsa 

 in the Prodrome of 1799. This is a somewhat doubtful species, but probably 

 the shell Lamarck had in mind was T. Bruguieri Hanley,* and if so the same 

 as Bruguiere's Figure 2. The second attempt of Lamarck exemplified Capsa f 



* Schumacher in 1817 (Essai, p. 130) applies the name Capsula to Asaphis, and 

 credits its authorship to Hwass, who prepared the manuscript of the Museum Calon- 

 nianum. 



t A shell extremely similar to this figure 2 of Bruguiere is figured by Chemnitz, 

 Conch. Cab., vi., p. 89, pi. 9, figs. 74-75, under the name of Tellina angulata of Linne, 

 and it is entirely probable that Lamarck had this in mind, though Hanley has shown 

 that it is probably not the original T. angulata of Linne. This was also Tryon's opinion. 



