196 PKOCEEBINGS OF THE MALACOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



NOTES 



Note on Biplommatina Strubelli, Smith. {Read \2>th Novemher, 

 1908.) — In the Annals and Magazine of Natural History, 1894, vol. xiii, 

 p. 463, in a paper giving an account of the land shells of the Natuna 

 Islands, the above species was described. It was subsequently noticed 

 that another species from the Molucca Islands, bearing the same name, 

 had already been published in the year 1891 by Dr. O. Boettger. It was 

 therefore proposed to apply the name D. Brunonis to the Natuna shell 

 in association with Herr Strubell's Christian name. As this change of 

 name was made in an obscure footnote in the Proc. Zool. Soc, 1895, 

 p. 124, which appears to have escaped the attention of the Zoological 

 Record, it has been thought advisable to again refer to this alteration. 



E. A. Smith. 



Note on "Photographic Conchologt" oe Stlvanus Hanley. 

 {Read \lth December, 1908.) — This work, which seems to be scarce and 

 little known, was published in 1863, and, as far as I can ascertain, 

 extended only to parts i-iii. Apparently the method of illustration was 

 not deemed successful, or the sale of the work may not have been sufficient 

 to warrant its continuance. 



It is referred to by Crosse under " Bibliographie " in the Journal de 

 Conchyliologie, 1864, vol. xii, p. 392 ; by Lea in his " Synopsis of the 

 family Unionidas," 1870, p. 178 ; by Hanley himself in the " Conchologia 

 Indica," pp. 6 and 55 ; by Troschel in the Archiv fUr Naturgeschichte, 

 1865, vol. ii, p. 121. 



These references to it, therefore, must be regarded as establishing its 

 publication, although from enquiries recently made of Messrs. Sotheran 

 nothing is now known by them of this work. 



Its full title is " Photographic Conchology, a second, or Photographic 

 series, of the Conchologieal Miscellany of Sylvanus Hanley." Samuel 

 Musgrave was the photoprinter and Willis & Sotheran the publishers. 



It appeared in quarto form, and altogether consisted of seven plates with 

 explanations, but no descriptive text accompanies them. The figures are 

 mostly much reduced, and the coloration not always very successful. The 

 method of production by photography secured correctness of outline, but 

 the surface ornamentation is much obscured owing to reduction and the 

 superimposed colour and gum-wash. The photographs were printed 

 and then cut out and pasted on sheets of stiff white paper about 8| by 

 b\ inches, which were then pasted on quarto sheets of thinnish paper of 

 a pale-green tint. The method was very clumsy and laborious, and 

 probably the time spent upon it made its production too tedious for 

 further continviation, or unremunerative. Upon the covers of the parts 

 it is stated that it is " the first application of photography to scientific 

 natural history." The price was Is. per plate coloured, or Sd. plain, so 

 that the whole work, as far as it appears to have been issued, cost only 

 a few shillings. 



Plates i-v include illustrations of Unionidse only, and plates vi and vii 

 species of Corbiculidse {Batissa, Cyreyia, and Corbicula). 



