NATURAL HISTORY MISCELLANY. 721 
apparent when I considered my locality. Berkshire Co. occupies 
the extreme western end of Massachusetts, and therefore its fauna 
closely resembles that of New York; and further, it is eminently 
a limestone country, and for this reason, the land-snails exist in 
wonderful abundance. Frequently in a morning’s walk I have 
met with twenty or thirty of the larger species and quite a number 
of the smaller ones. Helix fuliginosus Binney and H. inornata 
Say were found in great abundance and in nearly equal num- 
bers. In some localities, near the marble quarries, I found H. 
alternata Say in wonderful profusion, but in general it was an 
uncommon shell. H. tridentata Say, of which Mr. Morse says, 
it “occurs only rarely in the western part of Mass.,” was very 
common in my immediate vicinity. Next to albolabris, inornata 
and fuliginosis, it was the most common shell found. H. monodon 
was rather rare; hirsuta was still more so, as between myself and 
a friend collecting with me, we only obtained three or four speci- 
mens. Of H. palliata, recorded as being found at ‘*Copperas Hill, 
Vt.,” I found one perfect specimen; of H. Sayii, I found five or 
six perfect specimens and several bleached ones. Of the smaller 
shells, none could be considered common except H. labyrinthica, 
and Zua lubricoides. The former I found most common on moss- 
edvered rocks, comfortably packed away in the moist earth and 
roots, between the moss and the rock. The latter were always 
found at the base of rocks, among the moist leaves and in the 
earth itself. Judging from the collections made by myself and 
friend, I should say that the relative abundance of snail shells 
in that locality is expressed in the following numbers: H. fuligi- 
nosis, ten; inornata, ten; tridentata, five ; albolabris, four ; alter- 
nata, three; monodon, three ; labyrinthica, two; Zua lubricoides, 
two; H. Sayii, one; all others only occasional. This excludes 
the locality where alternata was so plenty ; if that be counted, it 
would place that species at two or three times all the others com- 
bined. I have given these notes because they show how much 
local variation may exist in the distribution of the land shells, 
and how much the extreme western part of Mass. resembles the 
` Middle or Western States, so far as its snail-life is concerned. — 
W. G. Freepiey, Philadelphia. 
CoxcHoLoGIcaL Nores — Mr Stearns called the attention of the 
California Academy of Sciences to the indefiniteness and errors in 
the catalogues of various families of the Mollusca, which are being 
