458 



FUNAFUTI ATOLL. 



Represented in this Museum from Port Curtis, Queensland, 

 and New Caledonia. 



MUREX ADUSTUS, Lamarck. 



Tryon, Man. Conch., ii., 1880, p. 90, pi. xv., figs. 148, 149 ; pi. 



xxiv., figs. 210-212 ; pi. xxv., fig. 217. 

 Common in shallow water in the lagoon of Funafuti. 



Noted from Lifu by Melvill and Standen, and represented in 

 this Museum from New Caledonia. 



MUREX FUNAFUTIENSIS, sp. nov. 

 (Fig. 35). 



Shell small, biconical. Colour ochra- 

 ceous buff, banded with chocolate, 

 interior of aperture pale lilac. Whorls 

 seven, sculptured each with seven pro- 

 minent varices, which mount the spire 

 continuously and obliquely. On the 

 spire each varix presents a hollow spine 

 above a blunt tubercle. Between and 

 parallel to the varices are a series of 

 imbricating lamellae. Five spiral ridges 

 run round the shoulder of the shell, 

 and undulate both the blades and the 

 interstices of the varices. The lamellae 

 are likewise microscopically beaded by 

 minute spiral threads. The aperture is 

 oblique, ovate, choked by an inner 

 tuberculate ridge, and by the great 

 development of the colurnella ; the 

 latter is arched, deeply obliquely enter- 

 ing, anteriorly with two incipient tubercles, and truncate below. 

 Canal short, open, and recurved ; above it are two series of 

 disused canals, corresponding to the ultimate and penultimate 

 varices. Length 9, breadth 5 mm. 



One specimen, taken by tangles, at a depth of forty to eighty 

 fathoms, on the western slope of Funafuti. 



This species approaches nearest to Murex nuclea, Reeve,* 

 which it resembles both in colour and form. Judging from his 

 account of that species, it differs by being just half the size, by 

 having seven whorls instead of five, with seven varices apiece 

 instead of six, and especially by being longer in proportion to 

 breadth, than the Philippine shell is. Whether these differences 

 are constant or not I cannot say. 



Fig. 35. 



* Reeve Conch. Icon, iii., 1845, Murex, pi. xxix., sp. 131. 



