174 JOURNAL OF CONCHOLOGY, VOL. 1 5, NO. 6, APRIL, 1917. 



misleading."^ Very similar reasoning is given in the same paper for 

 uniting Siphodentalium affine with S. lofotense, because, the writer 

 says, it is " quite impossible to separate the specimens when dealing 

 with them in hundreds" (p. 25). It is quite true that when large 

 numbers of the Turbonilla section of Odostomia are mixed together 

 they make a confusing group to the uninitiated, and that the living 

 specimens have a provoking way of assuming a different aspect to the 

 dead ones, but the difficulty cannot be overcome by lumping them 

 together in a hurry and calling their separation "unscientific and 

 misleading," whatever that may mean. The only advantage to be 

 claimed for this method is that it saves investigation and the trouble 

 of thinking. This species, at any rate, has been described for more 

 than half-a-century (1844), and its specific identity has received due 

 recognition from all competent authors. O. innovata and O. pusilla 

 are equally firmly established. 



O. scillae Scacc. — Off Loch Ryan 2 7f. 



O. compactilis Jeff. — My recorded Scillonian specimens (two) 

 may be open to some doubt. They are not altogether identical with 

 Atlantic specimens, neither can I connect them with their nearest 

 congener, O. aciciila. O. compactilis occupies a middle place between 

 O. acicula and O. scillce^ and is a somewhat critical species. 



lanthina rotundata Leach. — It is somewhat remarkable that 

 the lanthince. do not visit the Channel Islands. They occasionally 

 reach the Scilly Islands and the Land's End, but I have known only 

 one instance of their occurrence in the Channel Isles, and that was in 

 St. Clement's Bay, Jersey, where a considerable fleet was washed 

 ashore in mid-winter, 1916, in contrast to their usual arrival on our 

 coasts during the summer months. The local paper announcing their 

 arrival said "the sea was black with millions of small fish similar to a 

 nautilus, but very much smaller," though this was an exaggeration, 

 the gale certainly washing ashore a considerable mass of flotsam, sea- 

 weeds with their Aplysia inhabitants, and a large number oi lanthince. 



Stilifer turtoni Brod. — The shells of this species when fresh 

 caught are amber-coloured, but soon fade into pellucid-white. I have 

 already written that there are two distinct forms of the shell.^ That 

 the two forms are sexual I think is evident from the fact that they 

 are always present together in every colony of Stilifer that I have 

 examined. 



(To be conti?iued). 



Proc. R.I. Acad., 1898, vol. v., p. 23. 

 Journ. of Conch., 1900, vol. 9, p. 338. 



