PLATE CLXIII. 



milates so very closely with the Scalaria Australis that it is impossible 

 to consider the two shells as generically distinct ; indeed, those two 

 shells, so far from being generically different, approximate so 

 nearly to each other, that few observers, unaccustomed to those 

 minute distinctions which attract the regard of the naturalist, 

 would perceive any difference between them. In size, in form, and 

 colour they are alike, and yet at the same time they possess a cha- 

 racter that can leave no doubt of the two shells being really different. 

 The principal distinction consists in the angular form or ridge by 

 which the lower part of the greater whorl is traversed : while in 

 Turbo clathratus this convexity of the greater whorl is rounded, 

 in T. Australis it is angulated, and this distinction prevails in all 

 the examples of both species that have hitherto occurred. This 

 circumstance is more important to be observed than may be at first 

 conceived, for it clearly shews, that however nearly the testaceous 

 productions of that portion of the globe in which the British Isles 

 are situated, resemble those of the Antipodes and its vicinity in the 

 Southern Seas, there is yet a difference, which considered duly, must 

 assure us that the beings of those regions, though apparently similar, 

 ought not to be confounded with those of our climes. This acute 

 angulation, or carina, which characterises the lower whorl of the 

 spire of T. Australis, will be distinctly understood from the 

 figures in the annexed plate, in which the front as well as dorsal 

 views of the Australasian species are delineated. We need scarcely 

 add that those shells are inhabitants of the sea. 



