1834.] On the Land Shells of India. 87 



No. 10. — Genus Amicula. 



Species. — A. Scarabceus. Lam. 



Animal. — Unknown to me. 



Shell. — Ovate, flattened ; aperture with seven teeth ; right lip edged 

 and white ; left lip pale coloured and partially reflected ; whorls eight 

 or nine ; close. Colour pinkish chesnut, with a few darker marks here 

 and there. Spire short ; body whorl large and forming more than two- 

 thirds of the shell ; aperture longer than broad and flexuous. Length 

 about seven lines. 



I found this specimen on the banks of the Ganges in 1832. But I 

 do not recollect the place, and I made no memorandum of it at the time. 

 It was lying, however, a very little above the water line, on a sand 

 bank. It is the only specimen I have seen. 



In " Burrow's Elements of Conchology," this shell is described and 

 figured under the Linn^ean name of " Helix Scarabseus," in the follow- 

 ing manner. 



" Shell ovate, two edged, sub-umbilicate ; aperture toothed." 



" Specimen brown, variegated with pale spots, outer lip and teeth 

 horny, white ; whorls contiguous double convex ; aperture narrow, 

 compressed and flexuous ; each lip with three teeth ; inhabits Asia." 



The plate accompanying this description, and taken from a specimen, 

 at once shews it to be identical with the shell in my possession ; but the 

 author errs in saying " each Up with three teeth," inasmuch as his plate 

 and my specimen have only one large tooth on the inner lip, three on the 

 right lip, and (in the plate) two large teeth on the body whorl ; my 

 specimen has, besides the two on the body whorl, a very minute one 

 arising near the base of one of them, and which, although not noticed 

 by that author, is still nevertheless a distinct and decided tooth. 



La Marck says, it is " seven-toothed." 



Having now given a slight description of each species of land-shells 

 in my collection, I shall, before concluding my letter, mention a circum- 

 stance connected with most of them, for which I have not been able 

 satisfactorily to account, nor indeed have I as yet had an opportunity 

 of ascertaining, whether the fact, hereafter mentioned, may be consider- 

 ed as one of the constant habits of the animals, although from the ob- 

 servations I made at the time, I am strongly inclined to think, it may. 

 My attention was first called to the subject, while searching for Pupa? 

 No. 6. 



When proceeding in December, 1832, to join my regiment, my route 

 lay, from Futtehpoor Sikra to Neemuch, chiefly through a range of 

 low rocky hills, and observing great numbers of these Pupae, dead, in 

 ravines and on banks of nullahs, I naturally concluded that living 



