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ON THE KNOWN RECENT SPECIES OF THE GENUS VANIKORO, 

 QUOY & GAIMARD. 



By Edgar A. Smith, I.S.O. 



Bead lOth April, 1908. 



In working out a species of Vmiikoro from South Africa I had occasion 

 to consult the monographs which have been published upon this genus, 

 with the result that there seems to be much confusion respecting 

 several of the species, especially in the monographs by the late 

 G. B. Sowerby in Reeve's " Conchologia Iconica," vol. xx, and the 

 "Thesaurus Conchyliorum," vol. v. The last, for the most part, 

 is, in respect of the illustrations, practically a reproduction ■ of the 

 former, the various errors of identification being also continued. 

 Tryon (" Manual of Conchology ") in one or two cases has followed 

 Sowerby's erroneous determinations, besides perpetrating several 

 absurd ' lumpings ' of species. Sowerby's monograph is almost value- 

 less with respect to the references he gives, as uo pages are quoted, 

 and in some cases they are wholly wrong. 



The genus Vanikoro or Narica was first monographed by llecluz, 

 in the Proc. Zool. Soc, 1843, pp. 136-141, in the Revue Zoologique 

 for 1844, in Chenu's "Illustrations Conchy liologiques " in 1845, and in 

 the same year in the Magasin cle Zoologie. The three works appear 

 to have been unknown to or entirely disregarded by Sowerby. The 

 coarseness of many of the figures in the " Conchologia Iconica " gives 

 a totally wrong impression of the sculpture of the species. It is 

 hoped that the following comments may prove of some utility to 

 conchologists, as they are based upon an examination of the actual 

 types of many of the species. 



MM. Quoy & Gaimard, the authors of the work on the Mollusca 

 obtained by the "Astrolabe," recognized certain differential characters 

 in the animal of Sigaretus cmicellatus, Lamk., and appear at one 

 time to have thought of forming a genus for it, as distinct from 

 Velutina, in which they eventually placed that species, the designation 

 they suggested for the supposed new genus being Vanikoro, which is 

 the name of an island in the Pacific, north of the New Hebrides group. 



Since this, however, was not put forth as a distinct genus, it is 

 questionable whether it should now be adopted in preference to 

 Merria of Gray, which was published seven years afterwards.' As, 

 however, it is commonly in use, it seems advisable to retain it. With 

 regard to the genus Narica, which is preferred by Fischer, Crosse, 

 Bergh, and others, under any circumstances it is antedated both by 

 Merria, Gray, and Leucotis, Swainson. The first publication of Narica 

 appears to be in D'Orbigny's work on the Mollusca of Cuba, vol. ii, of 



1 Gray (P.Z. S., 1847, p. 156) adopted Vanicoro (sic), placing his Merria as a 

 synonym. 



