PLATE XXVIII. 



kind is described of a whitish colour, with the lobe at the base 

 abbreviated.* 



The two last-mentioned shells which Lamarck concludes to be 

 varieties of the same species, may perhaps prove hereafter to be 

 species distinct from each other, as Lamarck has himself shewn to be 

 the case with respect to the common black and the white hammer 

 shells. The black supposed variety of Malleus Normalis we appre- 

 hend to be distinct from the shell before us, but it is possible that the 

 New Holland shell which he describes as being whitish, with the lobe 

 at the base abbreviated, may be a worn or much depauperated spe- 

 cimen of our present shell ; it certainly does not accord with our 

 shell in any tolerable state of preservation. 



Lamarck says nothing of any ruddiness or testaceous hues in 

 his New Holland variety of Normalis^ and admitting these colours to 

 indicate that the shell had been found with its animal in a living state, 

 we can scarcely conceive the dark fuscous spotting which is so con- 

 spicuous in the species could by any ordinary accident be so entirely 

 obliterated as appears to be the case in Lamarck's specimen, if his 

 New Holland variety of Malleus NormaUs be really of this species ; 

 and it may be further added that if our present shell was actually 

 intended by his Malleus Normalis, the defects of his shell has 

 necessarily influenced his specific character and rendered it imperfect. 



We have not adverted to Malleus Anatinus of Chemnitz, 

 because the figure of that shell is ambiguous. There is a remote 

 resemblance in the lateral appendages of the beaks, but in other 



t Var. testsi albida ; lobo basis abbreviate. Ihid. 



