Mollusks. 2399 



of this, and is extremely thin, transparent and fragile : the head has something like 

 a neck : the face is prone and not porrected ; and the eyes extremely large, black and 

 prominent : the pulsations of a large artery which passes from the neck of the fish 

 into the attached egg is distinctly visible.— Edward Newman; March 18, 1849. 



New Shell. — " We are informed by Mr. Strange, the naturalist, that he has re- 

 cently discovered a new species of the genus Myochama, of which but one has been 

 hitherto known to conchologists, and is described by Sowerby as Myochama anomi- 

 oides : it is strictly a parasite shell, but not confined to one genus, as Mr. Strange 

 had been led to believe. It had been always supposed by scientific men that the 

 Myochama only attached itself to the Trigoine pectinata, but Mr. Strange has found 

 it on the Pectunculus Struthiolaria, the Pandora, the Venus, and Crassatella. A se- 

 cond species of this genus was found in sixty feet water on a sandy bottom : the first 

 specimen brought up by the dredge was on a dead valve of a species of Mytilus, 

 since which he has found it attached to dead valves of the Cleidothaerus and a species 

 of Lima ; and he has one attached to a piece of flat sand-stone. It is rather singu- 

 lar that he has never found one of the new species attached to a Trigoine or any other 

 shell which the Myochama Anomioides generally appends itself to." — Sydney Paper. 



Note on a Species of Bulimus. — " Here (near Sinope) I observed an elongated 

 shell, a species of Bulimus, peculiar to the basin of the Black Sea, hanging in great 

 numbers from the branches of almost every shrub. The appearance of this graceful 

 shell, in such abundance as to resemble the fruit of a plant, is very striking, and pre- 

 sents a remarkable instance of the manner in which Nature adapts herself to the va- 

 rious exigencies of animal life. The slimy secretion of the animal is dried up as the 

 hot weather comes on, forming an air-tight substance, by which it is defended from 

 the effects of the heat, and at the same time suspended from the branch ; with the re- 

 turning moisture the slime is dissolved, and the animal is at liberty to seek its food. 

 Thus these creatures remain in a state of torpidity during the summer, whereas others 

 generally pass the winter in that state. Tournefort (Engl. Transl. ii. 330) calls this 

 shell a Buccinum." — Hamilton s ' Researches in Asia Minor,' i. 319. 



Downy Epidermis of Paludina vivipara. — Is it generally known that the young 

 shells of Paludina vivipara are, sometimes at least, clothed with a downy epidermis, 

 rising into short spines round the middle of each volution ? The first such specimen 

 which I met with had so striking an appearance that I was ready to pronounce it 

 something quite new ; but it is impossible to preserve the covering in perfection, as 

 much of it disappears in drying. I cannot find this peculiarity mentioned in any of 

 the works on Conchology within my reach. — W. D. King ; Sudbury, \3tli of 3rd mo., 

 1849. 



Extraordinary abundance of Bulla akera at Walton-on-the-Naze. — I do not know 

 whether the extraordinary abundance in one locality of a mollusk which, at least in 

 my experience, had appeared rare, or not easy to obtain, may be worth recording in 

 the ' Zoologist ; ' but, possibly, to any conchologist who should chance to visit the 

 coast of Essex, the information may not be unwelcome that, at Walton-on-the-Naze, 

 the delicate Bulla akera is to be found in countless multitudes ; not, as far as I have 



