NATURAL HISTORY OF HAM1.\1:A SOLITARIA 

 SAY. 



The shell-bearing species of the family Bullidas have been 

 found freely distributed in the rocks since the Tertiary period. 

 A large number of species have been found as fossils. Ludwig 

 in Leunis Synopsis der Thierkunde states that there are between 

 two and three hundred recent species. They have a wide dis- 

 tribution in both European and American waters, being com- 

 monly found in the sandy and muddy bays of the temperate 

 regions. 



The Bullidce belong to the general order of Opisthobranchia 

 and to the suborder Tectibranchia. 



Thomas Say read before the Academy of Natural Sciences at 

 Philadelphia on July 24th, 1821, a paper in which he gives - An 

 account of some of the marine shells of the United States. " In 

 this article we have the first reference to Bulla soliiaria. His 

 description is as follows: Bulla solitaria. Shell remarkably 

 thin and fragile, pellucid, oval, narrowed at base, with numerous 

 impressed, revolving lines, and transverse very obtuse wunkles , 

 apertures surpassing the tip of the shell ; spire none, substituted 

 by an umbilicus ; umbilicus of the base none, less than half an 

 inch. Inhabits the southern coast of the United States. 



July 4th, 1835, J. G. Totten described a species of Bulla, 

 variety inscnlpta which he dredged in about fifteen teet of water 

 from the muddy bottom of the harbor at Newport,. K. I. He 

 maintains that inscnlpta is distinct from solitana because of 

 some slight variations in the color and shape of the shell. He 

 says, " Thus (inscnlpta) can hardly be Say's Bulla solitaria. It 

 is not umbilicated at the top as that species is ; having merely a 

 shallow pit in which nothing of the interior whirls can be seen. 

 The solitaria is described as being narrowed at the base; but 

 though our shell is regularly rounded in the passage, below, ot 



