Cr^VRMlDJE. 19T 



ments ; eyes on the middle of the tentacles or near their base ; 

 branchial plume single. Lingual ribbon long ; rachis 1-toothed ; 

 uncini 3 (xi, 30). 



Cypr^a, Linn. 



Cowry. Etym. — Cypris^ a name of Venus. 



Syn. — Porcellana, Rumph. Naria, Gray. Cypr^orbis and 

 Sulcocyprfea, Conr. Peribolus, Adans. 



Bistr. — 200 sp. Tropical and subtropical, on reefs and under 

 rocks at low-water. Fossil, 100 sp. Cretaceous-—; Europe, 

 India, United States. C. argus^ Linn. (Ixi, 96). G. exanthema^ 

 Linn., young (Ixi, 97). 



Shell ventricose, convolute, covered with shining enamel ; 

 spire concealed ; aperture long and narrow, with a short canal 

 at each end ; inner lip crenulated ; outer lip inflected and 

 crenulated. 



The young shell has a thin and sharp outer lip, a prominent 

 spire, and is covered with a thin epidermis. When full-grown 

 the mantle-lobes expand on each side, and deposit a shining 

 enamel over the whole shell, by which the spire is entirely con- 

 cealed. There is usually a line of paler color, which indicates 

 where the mantle-lobes met. Gypreea amiulus is used by the 

 Asiatic Islanders to adorn their dress, to weight their fishing- 

 nets, and for barter. Specimens of it were found by Dr. Layard 

 in the ruins of Nimroud. The money-cowry (0. moneta, Ixi, 1) 

 is also a native of the Pacific and Eastern seas ; manj^ tons 

 weight of this little shell are annually imported into England, 

 and again exported for barter with the native tribes of Western 

 Africa ; in the year 1848 sixty tons of the money-cowry were 

 imported into Liverpool. Mr. Adams observed the pteropodous 

 fry of C. annulus, at Singapore, adhering in masses to the mantle 

 of the parent, or swimming in rapid gyrations, or with abrupt 

 jerking movements by means of their cephalic fins. 



Bruguiere stated, and Lamarck believed, that as the animal 

 increased in size, it was obliged to leave its shell, in order to 

 make a new and more capacious one. The notion of Sowerby 

 and Reeve that Cj^praea can absorb the outer lip and form 

 another is not less fanciful. Such hypotheses were founded on 

 the circumstance that full-grown shells are often smaller than 

 half-grown specimens ; but the difference of size in individuals 

 of the present family is paralleled in many others. 



In their habits the cowries are shy and crawl slowly ; as they 

 glide along among the coral reefs, with the lateral lobes of their 

 mantle adorned with showj- colors, they present to the e3^e of 

 the naturalist objects of singular interest and beauty. 



LUPONiA, Gray. (Cypr^eidia, Swains.) Comprises the pyriform 

 species, having usually a few strong irregular plaits at the fore- 



