200 JOURXAT, OF CONCHOI.OGV, A'OL. I3, NO. 7, JUI.V, I9II. 



zetlandica ; that figure more correctly represents the thin deep-water 

 form of var.y7^A7/(^j'(^? mentioned above; Sowerby's figure would do for 

 \^\. favperciila, but not this ; while the figure in "British Mollusca" 

 (pi. cix., f. 4) is perfect, as most of them are in this well-illustrated work. 



The Leckenby collection contained an adult specimen of the var. 

 pmipcrciila, little more than half an inch in length, one of a pair said 

 by Mr, Robert Damon to have been dredged in Weymouth Bay, and 

 which changed hands for i o/-. On the other hand, specimens from 

 Thurso and Wick are very large, coarse, and solid, attaining 6in. by 

 3|in. ; this is the var. incrassaici of King; but coarse and solid 

 examples occur of every size. 



Monstrosities are numerous, and many of them have received 

 special names. Two splendid figures of Turton's B. carijinttivi will be 

 found in Brown's "Recent Conchology," and "Science Gossip" for Apr., 

 1894, contains figures of the curious malformation called monst. 

 bioperculahDii. As to the monst. triopeiciilaluni Jeff, that was the 

 outcome of a too eager inquiry, accompanied by a liberal offer, made 

 many years ago to the whelk-dealers for a specimen, and with the 

 inevitable result — as nature could not produce one to order, a 

 counterfeit was manufactured, and successfully palmed off to a dealer, 

 but it did not travel any further. No genuine specimen of this 

 "sport" has been recorded. 



In dealing with the phenomena of sinistral shells, Gwyn Jeffreys 

 says that the animal "may be compared to the case of a man having 

 his heart on the right and his lungs on the left side of his body. The 

 structure of a mollusc is, however, not so complicated, and the con- 

 sequence of such a reversal in the position of its organs is jjrobably 

 not very important to its economy."^ I do not know how Gwyn 

 Jeffreys came to regard the lungs as being on one side only of the 

 body, for as a matter of fact one lung is on the right and another 

 on the left side, and in a sinistral case the right and left lungs would 

 presumably be simply transposed. As to the consequence of a 

 similar reversal of organs m the human subject, one instance has 

 been placed on record of such a case, an account of which appeared 

 in a Vienna paper in 1894, of which the following is a summary : — ■ 

 " A man, named Adolph Schlesinger, died in Vienna in November 

 of that year, whose heart was on the right side, and almost all of 

 whose internal organs — milt, liver, and intestines — were found to be 

 opposite their usual place, but who never felt any inconvenience from 

 this cause. Having some years previously accidentally learned of 

 the unusual arrangement of his internal economy, he offered to sell 

 his body to the British Museum [? Royal College of Surgeons] for 



Brit. Conch., vol. i., Intiodtictioii, p. xni. 



