94 IOWA STUDIES IN NATURAL HISTORY 
ida Keys.. No doubt it is also very abundant in Barbados but 
we did not have the good fortune to fall upon a favorable sta- 
tion. 
Had we been equipped with surface tow-nets it is likely we 
might have added some living pteropods to our collection. In 
practically all our stations in blue water we took quantities of 
the dead tests of these pelagic mollusks. In some places the 
ocean bottom must be very thickly strewn with these glassy 
bizarre looking little shells. We collected ten species in all, 
mostly in quantity and often in very fresh and perfect condi- 
tion. Seven species of Cavolina, one of Cuvierana, and two of 
Cliodora registers the total. Strangely enough we took no 
examples of Limacina. The number of possible recorded spe- 
cles we might have seen is about twice our actual catch but the 
average for a field of operation so exceedingly small as ours is 
remarkably good. The most striking species we obtained (only 
five specimens) is Cavolina tridentata Forskal, a veritable giant 
among the other species of our catch. It has the great range of 
the whole Atlantic from the north to the south forties. 
Although our main efforts were directed toward marine work 
the land mollusks were by no means neglected. Whenever any- 
one went ‘‘ashore’’ he was always on the lookout for land’ 
shells and in both Barbados and Antigua we succeeded in col- 
lecting most of the recorded species. As compared with the ex- 
traordinary richness of mollusecan life in Cuba, Jamaica and 
the other islands of the Greater Antilles—a faunal wealth 
scarcely equalled elsewhere in any part of the world—the Lesser 
Antilles possess but a scant fauna. It not mfrequently hap- 
pens, however, that individual species are quite abundant. 
Barbados being truly an oceanic island separated from all 
other land by sea depths of-over 1000 fathoms, we might expect 
to find thereon a mixed lot of land shells derived from other 
island and the near-by continent; the number of ‘‘Barbadian’’ 
species, if any, would depend upon the length of time of their 
isolation in the Barbadian environment. Among the first spe- 
cies to be observed was the large Strophocheilus (Borus) ob- 
longus Mull., one of the several importations from South Amer- 
ica. This big snail lives abundantly all over the island especial- 
ly in gardens. During the dryer portions of the year it buries 
