40 THE CHICAGO ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 



living for two months in fresh, wet moss. Clessin 4 in commenting 

 upon this statement, remarks that Lymnsea is naturally able to live for 

 a considerable time in wet air, but doubts the possibility of accustom- 

 ing them to this condition. 



Pilsbry 5 reports the following instance concerning the ability of 

 Galba bulimoidcs cocker elli to resist drought "Specimens of a very 

 short-spired form of this species were lately received from Mr. George 

 H. Clapp, with the following note : 'They were collected by my 

 cousin, George H. Pepper, from a water-hole that appeared to be dry 

 most of the year, near Farmington, New Mexico, on September 20, 

 1896, and reached me, packed in cotton, on October 5. On the 4th 

 of this month (November) I dropped them into warm water to soak 

 them loose from the cotton, and about two dozen out of 50 or more 

 came to life. They had been out of water 45 days ! The shells spend 

 nearly as much time out of water as in it, frequently crawling to the 

 top of the glass in which I keep them.' Out of 4 specimens sent 

 alive, packed in dry cotton, one revived at once upon being placed in 

 water, after an additional journey, dry, from the 6th to the 9th of 

 November. The survivor has a translucent or almost water-colored 

 body, closely peppered with opaque white ; eyes black ; tentacles opaque 

 white; a dark stripe on back starting between tentacles. With the 

 Limnaeas were some of the little bivalve Phyllopod crustacean, 

 Estheria mexicana Claus." 



The author has frequently received living Lymnaeas which had 

 been packed in wet cotton or moss and which had been deprived of 

 water for a week or ten days. 



f. ABNORMALITIES. 



The Lymnaeas are subject to many forms of abnormal growth. 

 The spire may be scalariform, a part of the last whorl may be de- 

 tached from the body whorl or the aperture may be twisted out of 

 shape. These abnormal conditions may be caused by disease, by acci- 

 dent or by parasitism. A particular case due to the latter cause is re- 

 ported by Sykes 1 from Davos Lake, Switzerland (5,000 feet alt.). The 

 species was Radix auricularia and the shells were peculiarly con- 

 stricted and channeled some distance from the edge of the outer lip. 

 Brot 2 has recorded that nine-tenths of the Lymncoa pcregra inhabiting 

 a pond near Geneva, Switzerland, were peculiarly malformed at the 

 base of the columella. Singularly enough this deformity was coinci- 



"Mal. Blatt., (2). II, p. 199, 1880. 



5 Nautilus X, p. 96. 



Mourn, of Mai.. Ill, p. 34. 



2 Proc. Verb. Soc. Mai. Belg., VI, p. xlviii. 



