1872.] 261 



On the land shells of Penang island, with descriptions of the 



ANIMALS AND ANATOMICAL NOTES ; part first, CxCLOSTOMACEA, 



by Db. F. Stoliczka. 



(Bead and received 6th August, 1872). 

 [With plate X.] 



Penang, or Prince of Wales island, although possessing a rich vegeta- 

 tion, growing on old metamorphic soil, a moderately hilly ground, and a moist 

 warm climate, — all elements most favorable to Molluscous life, — has up the 

 present time yielded a comparatively very small number of land shells, and 

 this in spite of the repeated visits which it had received from numerous 

 travellers to the East. I can scarcely find record of more than ten species 

 of both Cyclostomacea and Helicacea, which had been reported to occur on 

 Penang. The paucity of shells seemed to me scarcely credible ; but, when 

 visiting the island in 1869, I was not a little astonished to meet for days 

 with nothing else except Bulimus atricallosus and citrinus, and Helix simi- 

 laris in the low country, cultivated with coco-palms and nutmegs, while in 

 the hills the only common species were a Hotula and Cyclopli. Malayanus, 

 Benson's Helix Cymatvum, described from Lancavi, being much rarer. After 

 many days wanderings I noticed that all those portions of the ground, 

 which at any, even remote, time shewed signs of having been once under 

 cultivation, were hopeless in a malacological point of view, and I turned 

 into the more wild and deep ravines of the North-Western part of the 

 island. There, after some days search, particularly in the extensive and very 

 dense forests along the edges of more open tracks, abounding with a rich 

 under-vegetation, I was more successful by adding a good number of land 

 shells to the few already known. Many of these are new to science, and as 

 I had obtained all the species alive, and noted the peculiarities of the 

 structure of the animals, my observations, even as regards the few formerly 

 described species, may be useful in supplementing the information which we 

 already possess. 



I shall begin in this first part of the paper with the Ctclostojiacea, 

 of which ten species will be reported. My remarks will on this occasion not 

 enter into anatomical details, because I wish to reserve these for a com- 

 prehensive study on the anatomy of all the Indian and Barmese species of 

 this group, and the isolated facts would not prove equally interesting as 

 when related in connection with others. 



In the second part, which will treat of the Helicacea, I will, however, 

 give' all those anatomical details, which are in many instances essential for 

 the correct determination of the different genera. 



