CONCHOLOGY. 



1 ought not to close these remarks without observing, that thesd 

 skells vary so considerably that no two specimens have yet occurred 

 that agree precisely with each other. Some approach also, but are 

 clouded instead of banded ; these are the French Cedo nulli gra- 

 phique, Conus mappa of Solander, and being held in less esteem 

 from having their colours disposed in clouds instead of bands, have 

 obtained the name of the false Cedo nulli. The transitions of these 

 shells, it must be confessed are so various as to render it extremely 

 difficult, if not unsafe, to determine where one species ends and 

 another commences, the difference in the colours affords no sufficient 

 data, neither is the form of the shell, nor the height of the spire so 

 uniformly certain as to constitute a precise criterion. 



Linnaeus^ in his description of the conchological cabinet of her 

 majesty Ludovica Ulrica, the Queen of Sweden ^, speaks of three 

 different varieties of Conus Ammiralis » Ammiralis summus, fiAm- 

 rniralis ordinarius, y Ammiralis occidentalis, and these are again 

 recited in his Systema Natura. But it will be seen from the last 

 edition of that work, by Professor Griielin, that the varieties dis- 

 covered subsequently to the age of that inestimable naturalist are 

 very considerable, amounting to no less than thirty different kinds, 

 and these do not include the whole at present known. Gmelin, it 

 should be added, admits only two or three kinds as the true Cedo 

 NULLI, which he characterizes essentially as being encompassed 

 with dotted articulated belts, Cedo nulli cingulis punctato-articulatis ; 

 one he describes as being yellow, painted with red, and marked with 

 eleven distinct belts of milk white ; another^ orange with crouded 

 elevated interrupted chesnut lines, 



