SIPHO TOR IU'S. 371 



International Zoological Congress some years ago a resolution was passed that no 

 names older than the 10th edition of Linne should be recognised. Originally 

 exceptions were to be permitted under special circumstances, but at a subsequent 

 Congress, after a long discussion and in spite of the strenuous opposition of the 

 President and Secretary of the Commission appointed to consider the matter, a hard 

 and fast rule was carried, by a majority of votes only, that the Law of Priority 

 should be strictly enforced in every case. This rule may be important generally, 

 though at any time it may be revoked, but I submit that exceptions to it, as in the 

 case of an old and firmly established name like the present one, may be equally so. 

 To this day Sijrfio and not Tritonofusus is used by French Conchologists like Dollfus, 

 Dautzenberg, Fischer, and Cossmann who apparently decline to be bound by the 

 votes of a body, the majority of the members of which have no knowledge of the 

 special circumstances of the case. Sipho is generally used, moreover, in recent 

 Scandinavian works. It seems to me that the study of fossil names is less 

 important than that of fossil shells. In the present case the proposed alteration 

 in the old nomenclature, which has no special scientific value, would tend to cause 

 confusion to students of the Crag deposits, rather than remove it. 



Sipho torrus (Locard). Plate XXXVIII, figs. 10, 11. 



1897-9. Neptunea torra, Locard, Exped. scient. du Travailleur et du Talisman, Mollusques testaces, 

 vol. i, p. 361, pi. xvii, figs. 21—25, 1897; Coq. mar. Cotes de France, p. 63, 1899. 



1902. Neptunea torra, Pallary, Journ. de Conch., vol. 1, p. 9. 



1906. Sipho torrus, Dautzenberg et H. Fischer, Camp, scient. Pr. Monaco, vol. xxxii (Mollusques), 

 p. 22, pi. ii, figs. 2—5. 



1908. Neptunea (Sipho) torra, Kobelt, Icon, schalentrag. europ. Meeresconch., vol. iv, p. 147, pi. exxiii, 

 fig. 3 ; pi. exxv, figs. 2, 3. 



Specific Characters. — Shell solid, slender, turreted, lanceolato-fusiform, smooth 

 and polished ; whorls 7 or 8, slightly convex, the last two-thirds the total length, 

 excavated below ; ornamented by exceedingly fine inconspicuous spiral striae and 

 by the lines of growth ; spire acuminate, regularly decreasing in size towards a 

 small, obtuse and planorboid apex ; suture slight ; mouth ovate, narrow, angulate 

 above ; canal rather short, turning to the left. 



Dimensions. — L. 30 — 40 mm. B. 12 — 15 mm. 



Distribution. — Recent .• west Atlantic coast from the Bay of Biscay to Morocco. 

 Fossil : Wexford gravels. 



Remarks. — In a parcel of Wexford fossils received from Father Codd, I noticed 

 the one now figured under the above name, which, although imperfect, corresponds 

 in M. Dautzenberg's opinion with some specimens of the recent species, Sipho 

 torrus, obtained during the expedition of the Travailleur and Talisman, from a 

 depth of 750 metres ; one of these he has kindly allowed me to figure. The 



