168 Transactions.—Zoology. 
Art. XXII.—Description of two little-known Species of New Zealand Shells. 
By W. Cotenso, F.L.8. © 
[Read before the Hawke's Bay Philosophical Institute, 14th November, 1881.] 
AutHoucH just forty years have passed since I first detected and made 
known these two shells, one marine and one fresh-water, which I now bring 
before you, I have good reasons for believing they are still but little known. 
Their scientific description, etc., was early published in the ‘* Tasmanian 
Journal of Natural Science,”* but I do not find them noticed in any of the 
modern conchological works in our library, under my own or any other 
specific names ; neither are they included in the exhaustive ‘* List of New 
Zealand Mollusca,”’ recently laboriously compiled from almost all concho- 
logical authorities by Professor Hutton, and published last year by the 
New Zealand Government. I therefore conclude that they are still but 
little known. This, however, may be easily accounted for, if, as I suppose, 
the single localities in which I separately found them are their only known 
habitats; as such are quite out of the way of both the scientific and general 
traveller ; and although I sought them diligently in my early and general 
collecting of the shells of this country, I never met with these species any- 
where else. At the time, however, of their discovery, I distributed several 
specimens to various parts of the world. 
You will not fail to note, in examining the specimens before you, how 
exceedingly well they have kept both their original colours and freshness of 
epidermis, more resembling specimens newly obtained, than those of forty 
years slumbering in a cabinet. In again giving their scientific description, 
I shall, on account of conformit » confine myself to the terms I used in the 
original drawing up, although at that very early period without scientific 
books. 
Genus Patella. 
PaTELLA soLaNpRI: Shell oval, anteriorly truncated, much depressed, 
faintly striated longitudinally, diaphanous, fragile, covered with a thin 
epidermis ; inside, smooth, glossy ; vertex, very much anteriorly inclined, 
sub-acute, produced, slightly recurved ; margin, entire, obsoletely crenulated 
within ; colour, bluish green, concentrically streaked with brown, beautifully 
blotched, or tortuously undulated, with same colour towards margin; 5-7 
lines long, 4-5 lines broad. 
Hab. Adhering to the underside of large smooth stones; Tokomar 
(Tegadoo) Bay, East Coast, North Island of New Zealand. oe 
* Discovered in December, 1841, and published in « Tasmanian Journal of Natural 
Science,” vol, ii., pp. 226, 250. ' 
