70 PALEONTOLOGY OF NEW JERSEY. 
On page 293 of the same article the author includes under this genus 
his Volutilithes bella and V. mucronata with several others. In the synopsis of 
the Volutide which Mr. Gabb gives in this same article he places these 
under that family without question. The two species just mentioned, bella 
and mucronata, so far as I am able to determine, are precisely the same 
generically as the typical species of Piestochilus Meek, and are certainly 
more nearly related to the Fasciolariide than to the Votutide, even if the 
type of Volutoderma, V. Conradi, should be considered as related to the 
latter family; which, from its narrow elongated canal and nearly vertical 
columellar folds, I should be inclined to dispute. There is certainly no 
feature possessed by these two species that could be considered as incom- 
patible with those of Meek’s genus; although we do not know their surface 
characters. But we have no evidence of the strong vertical or revolving 
folds and ridges which apparently characterize Volutomorpha Conradi. 1am, 
however, inclined to retain both genera under the family Fasciolariide, and 
shall place these two, and other allied species under Piestochilus, retaining 
the V. Conradi for Gabb’s generic division; the principal points of difference 
between them being in the shorter spire and longer beak of Volutomorpha, 
with its strong surface markings and the more equally fusiform body and 
proportionally shorter canal of Piestochilus, with its probable striated sur- 
face and more. subdued vertical folds. Mr. Tryon, in his Structural and 
Systematic Conchology, vol. 2, p. 129, cites Piestochilus as a synonym of 
Clavella Swainson, and states that Meek suspected that it belonged to that 
genus. I can not find anywhere that Mr. Meek suspected it as belonging to 
Clavella. He did at one time place some of the species under Clavellites 
Swainson. In the U.S. Geol. Surv. Terr., vol. 9, Invert. Pal., almost the 
last thing Mr. Meek wrote, he places the genus under the Fasciolariide, to 
which it undoubtedly belongs. | 
