128 BRITISH M0LLT7SKS. 



ConovuhlS myosotis. {Much enlarged.) 



Genus II. CONOVTJLTJS. 



Animal ; violaceous yellow or grey, carrying a fusiformly oblong 



shell, head slightly lobed, produced into a broad ringed muzzle ; 



upper tentacles rather stout, with the eyes a little behind their 



inner base, lower tentacles represented by a pair of closely 



approximating tubercles. 



Shell ; fusiformly oblong or ovate, opake-white or yellowish horny 



covered by a brown epidermis, whorls six to seven, smooth, 



sometimes faintly puckered at the sutures ; aperture oblong, 



columella plaited and more or less toothed, lip sometimes toothed 



within on a thickened ridge. 



The Conovuli Live in brackish marshes, sometimes at a distance 



of two or three miles from the sea, but mostly inhabit the mouth 



of rivers, in the crevices of the stems or about the roots of water 



plants, or in the mud or sand of the seashore, within range of the 



spray of the sea. 



They can scarcely, however, be said to be marine. They do not 

 live in situations reached by the tide ; they are not amphibious, 

 but respire air, and are characterized by the same organization as 

 the Carychia, which inhabit inland locahties. In the sahne swamps 

 and marshes of intertropical countries, the Conovuli are more nume- 

 rous ; and in the nearest allied genus, Auricula, which is the type of 

 the group, they attain a large size. 



The animal of Conovulus has a broad, obtuse muzzle, an incipient 

 development of that which is so conspicuous a feature in Cyclo- 

 stoma; and the eyes are situated about the middle of the inner base 

 of the tentacles, directed a little behind. The shell is of six or 

 seven whorls, convoluted in a fusiformly oblong shape, with the 

 columella plaited and more or less toothed. The inner lip is some- 

 times reflected, sometimes simple, and when simple it has a toothed 



