IGO PLIOCENE MOLLUSCA. 



Distribution. — Fossil: Icenian Crag: Bramerton. 



BemarJcs. — In the Fitch collection at the Norwich Museum there are several 

 unfigured specimens from the Icenian Crag of Bramerton corresponding to some 

 extent with a Recent shell from Behring Sea which I have received from Dr. 

 Odhner under the name of N. furnicata var. mult i striata, and somewhat less with 

 those figured by Prof. Leche as Fusus fornicatus, Reeve.^ In other respects, 

 however, our Crag fossils differ too widely, especially m the form of the last whorl 

 and the canal, to justify their reference to the Behring Sea shell. It seems safer, 

 therefore, to regard them for the time as an abnormal variety of the polymorphous 

 Crag species N. despecta. There are some specimens in the British Museum and 

 in the Castle Museum at Norwich, one of them being here figured for comparison 

 (PI. Xyill, fig. 2). They were described by Wood {op. cit.) as Purpura lapiUus, 

 vvir. angulata, but possibly they may be a modified form of the present variety. 



Var. intersculpta (Cx. B. Sowerby). Plate XVIII, tig. 5 ; Plate XXV, fig. 1. 



1899. Chr y socio inus i titer sculptus, G. B. Sowerby, Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. [7j, vol. iv, p. 371, fig. 2. 



Varietal Characters. — Resembling generally the carinated varieties of X 

 despecta described above, except that the last whorl is more tumid and the 

 sculpture different ; the stronger spiral ridges are not so prominent and the 

 intermediate ones are coarser. 



Dimensions. — L. 80 — 130 mm. B. 48 — 75 mm. 



Distribution. — Recent: Behring Sea; Tango, Japan. 



Fossil : Butleyan Crag : Butley. Icenian : Yarn Hill ; probably 

 elsewhere in the upper horizons of the Crag. 



Remarks. — The Recent shell here figured was dredged by the Vega expedition 

 in Behring Sea (lat. 62° 39' N., long. 177° 51' W.), and was sent to me by Dr. 

 Odhner under the name of N. despecta, var. carinata. Murex carina tus, Pennant, 

 however, seems to have been a different form, as before explained (p. 164). These 

 shells prove to be identical with a Japanese species recently described by Mr. G. B . 

 Sowerby as Ghrysodomus intersculp)tus, the specific name of which was suggested by 

 the finer spiral ridges which occur between the stronger and more prominent 

 ones.^ If, as I suppose, this rather distinct shell is now confined to the Pacific, we 

 are justified, I think, in retaining Mr. Sowerby's name, but as it and another 

 similarly sculptured form, next to be described, occur in the English Crag, I am 

 inclined with Dr. Odhner to regard the present shell as a geographical variety of 

 N. despecta. I propose to figure the specimen from Yarn Hill in PI. XXV of this 

 Memoir. 



^ K. Svensk. Vet. Akad. Handl. Stockholm, (n. s.) vol. xvi [2], p. 66, pi. ii, fig. 27, 1878. 

 ~ Mr. Sowerby's figure does not accuratel}" represent the intersculptate ridges of this shell. 



