246 F. Stoliczka — Notes on Terrestrial Mollusca. [No. 3, 



Genus. Macrochlamys, Benson. 

 Semper speaks (Eeisen im Arch, der Philipp., Ill, pt. I, p. 17) 

 of the receipt of " numerous specimens from Calcutta through Dr. 

 Anderson" of Macrochlamys splendens, Hutton. This species was 

 described from Mahasii, near Simla, where I also collected it some 

 years ago. The shell has the outer lip internally thickened, a 

 character which is peculiar only to hill species and is, I believe, 

 chiefly the result of the testaceous, false, operculum not having been 

 entirely absorbed after hibernation. It is by no means a constant 

 character. H. splendens does not occur in or about Calcutta, nor 

 anywhere in the plains, as far as I have been able to ascertain, but 

 I found it, or a very closely allied form, at Missouri and at Nyneetal 

 in the Himalayas. Dr. Anderson, as I have ascertained from him- 

 self, had not received any animals of the species in question from 

 the N. "West Himalayas, but those he sent to Dr. Semper were from 

 Darjeeling, where a species, closely allied to Hutton' s H. splendens, 

 is very common, and, if not full grown, is very similar to a shell 

 which is by Indian conchologists usually called II. vitrinoides, Desh. 



There occur two allied forms of the vitrinoides type about Cal- 

 cutta : one very flat, with the base conspicuously concave about 

 the umbilicus ; it is very closely allied to II. luhrica, Bens. The 

 other is a little higher and is said to be vitrinoides, Desh. Both are 

 thin shells, the former appears to have no trace of spiral striation ; 

 in tlie other the strise become traceable when the superficial glossy 

 polish is weathered off, but even then they are not nearly so strongly 

 marked as in splendens. Neither of these Calcutta species agrees 

 sufficiently with the original description of Deshaye's Helix vitri- 

 noides, but there have been so many other allied species — peclina, 

 decussata, sequax, resplendens, &c, and lately one or two by Sem- 

 per and Martens — described, that it would be unsafe to augment 

 the already confused literature with new names without previously 

 most carefully comparing all the allied forms. Among all the 

 Indian Zonitid^e the species of the vitrinoides type are certainly 

 the most difficult of discrimination. 



With reference to the name Macrochlamys itself, I would only 

 observe that it is not correct, when Dr. Semper questions the 

 generic determination of the Bengal H. vitrinoides, Desh., as a 



