THE YOUNG NATURALIST. 



31 



L. Maximus. — This slug sometimes attains to the length of half-a-foot or 

 more, and consequently is one of the largest of our British species. Its dis- 

 tinctive features are these :— 



1. Colour varying from ashy-grey to dusky -yellow and even black, some- 

 times spotted or streaked with white or black. 



2. Mantle oblong, swollen, elongated to a point behind, with well devel- 

 oped striae. 



8. Tentacles long. 



4. Body keeled near the tail. 



5. Foot with a white border. 



6. Slime whitish. 



7. Shell (under the mantle) oblong, slightly convex above, concave below, 

 with a membranaceous margin. 



When you have made sure of your species irritate one, and notice how it 

 shows its anger by dilating its mantle. I do not know any other slug which 

 does this. But it is also infested by a parasite, and this parasite unbalked 

 by its tenacious slime, runs over its body with an agility that is quite astonish- 

 ing. You have noticed this no doubt. As maximus travels it forms the 

 railway saloon for these little creatures, which enjoy themselves most thoroughly 

 in their curious little antics. They scarcely ever leave the body of their host, 

 the respiratory cavity of the slugs serving the purpose of their house, and the 

 pulmonary aperture, the function of a door. The name of this parasite — if 

 it be really a parasite in our present acceptation of the term — is Philodromus 

 limacum. 



The type is grey, banded with the same colour but of a darker tint, and 

 the mantle covered over with black spots. Now for the varieties. There are 

 a good many of these. VdLY. fasciata is grey like the type, but the bands are 

 white, and generally five in number ; var. ciuerea is ashy, without spots, and 

 with the mantle bluish-black ; var. ohscura is entirely brown ; var. rufescens 

 is entirely reddish ; var. Ferrusaci is whitish with four rows of black spots 

 on the mantle and body ; var. Johnstoni is ashy with black spots and two 

 bands of the same colour, and with the mantle also spotted with black ; var. 

 maculata is ashy, without bands, but with the mantle and body marked with 

 irregularly-shaped black spots ; var. cellaria is ashy with the mantle spotted 

 with black, and with the back marked with interrupted bands of the same 

 colour, and presenting lines and points which alternate with each other ; and 

 lastly, var. marmorata has a light greyish-brown colour with ill-marked grey 

 bands and black spots scattered in their interstices, and with the mantle also 

 marbled and spotted but lighter in its posterior than in its anterior portion, 



