118 



NOTE ON LANISTES MAGNUS, FUETADO. 



By Edgak a. Smith, I.S.O. 



Read lOth April, 1908. 



This species was described^ from a single specimen collected by the 

 Portuguese explorers, Messrs. Capello and Ivens, in the River Luapula 

 in North-Eastern Rhodesia. The British Museum last year received 

 two specimens from Mr. R. L. Harger which he obtained from the 

 same river. He observes that " these molluscs constitute the main 

 food of the Stork {Anastomus lamellifferus), which birds probe the mud 

 and sudded marshes in flocks of hundreds, leaving the surface strewn 

 with broken and whitened shells, so that perfect specimens can only be 

 found by feeling about in the mud and water vegetation." 



This is the largest known species of the genus Lanistes, and is 

 chiefly distinguished from other species by its great size. The two 

 shells obtained by Mr. Harger difi'er somewhat in form and sculpture 

 from the type, having a shorter spire and a broader body-whorl, and 

 besides the strong lines of growth the surface in places is more or less 

 distinctly malleated. The periostracum of one specimen is of the 

 ordinary olivaceous tint common to many species, but in the other 

 example which is older it is quite black, although not a dead shell. 

 The operculum is very thin, yellowish horny beneath, and coated 

 above with a thin dirty whitish incrustation. For so large a shell it is 

 decidedly small, and does not close up the aperture until it has been 

 drawn within fully two inches from the peristome. 



1 Journ. de Conch., 1886, vol. xxxiv, p. 147, pL vi, fig. 3. 



