1864.] 



Notes, on some Indian and Burmese Helieidce. 



249 



I cannot conclude this paper without offering a few remarks on the 

 arrangement proposed by my friend, Mr. W. T. Blanford, for the 

 Helieidous groups in the Annals and Magazine of Natural History for 

 February, 1863. The division of the whole, into two great groups or 

 sections,- — A marked, by having the mucous pore at the truncated 

 extremity with a superimpending lobe, and — B having the mucous 

 pore in the elongated non-truncate extremity, devoid of an overhanging 

 lobe, — is a natural and probably well marked one* but I think a still 

 farther restriction of the term jSTanina, than that Mr. Blanford has 

 adopted, is called for in any natural classification. 



We there find (loo. cit.) shells of two very naturally divided types 

 all ranged together under JTantn^ or its subgenus Macrocjilamys, 

 B. illustrated respectively by the species, Vitrinoides, lubriea and 

 petasus on the one hand, and pansa and similar unpolished shells on 

 the other. A more natural arrangement would surely be to restrict 

 the term Nanina to those shells of the great Section A possessing a 

 polished epidermis, of which N. vitrinoides may be regarded as the 

 type, indicatory as such a condition of the surface usually is, of either 

 lubricatory tentacular processes attached to the mouth, as in the type, 

 or of close relations to the more typical species so provided. 



This separation effected, the remainder form a natural group of 

 which pansa may serve as a type, but want of all books of reference, 

 prevents iny offering any generic name, which a little research will 

 soon supply. In this Section A, it may be remarked that Mr. Blan- 

 ford includes H. ligulata, whilst JH, Tranqiheharica and its allies he 

 ranges under Section B. 



In the present paper I have included them, from a mere study of 

 the shells, under one group, (Galaxias), which I should not have ven- 

 tured to do in opposition to Mr. Blanford's observations, but for his 

 remark on S. ligulata, which " shows a passage into the other Sec- 

 tion" It is therefore probably aberrant to some extent from Tran- 

 guebarica, but not more so perhaps than from the group with which 

 Mr. Blanford has associated it. Mr. Blanford's remark on the simi- 

 larity of the animals of H. vittata, Fer. and S. faUaciosa.Fer. is inter- 

 esting, as a shell given to me by Mr. H. F. Blanford* tends to connect 



* H. proximo, Fer. Besides the difference in form H. proximo, has a white 

 interior. H. vittata invariably brown or brownish black when adult. H. F. B. 



2k2 



J 



