351 



H. H. Andei'son — Noteit on Indian Eotifers. [No. 4, 



Family XIII. Salpinadse. 



I have Lad some difficulty in distinguishing between the species of 

 this family, as different sjaecimens of the same species differ greatly from 

 one another. 



25. Salpina brevispina, Ehrenberg. 

 Is very common. 



26. Salpina eustala, Gosse. 

 Not uncommon. In some the alvino spines were only slightly incur- 

 ved ; in one the lumbar spine was irregular in shape, having a wavy ap- 

 pearance, and the sinus above the pectoral spine was less marked and 

 less deep than usual. 



27. Salpina maceacantha (?), Gosse. 

 The anterior and posterior ends of the ventral side of the lorica 

 were deeply excised, the spines, lumbar and alvine, were long, and in 

 size and shape the specimens answered to the description and to the 

 figures in Hudson and Gosse's work, but the surface of the lorica 

 was most plainly stippled, though in the work mentioned it is expressly 

 stated that the lorica surface is not stippled. Many specimens were 

 examined and they all had the stippling. 



28. Salpina, sp., PI. XXI, Kgs. 8 & 8a. 

 A fourth species seems to be intermediate between S. macracantha 

 and <S. hrev 'ispina, but it is so variable that 1 hesitate to make a new 

 species of it. Its most obvious distinction from 8. Irevispina is its size, 

 and, as I have had both specimens under observation at the same time, I 

 think this may be of some weight, though size by itself is probably not of 

 much value as a specific differential in our Indian species, which exhibit 

 a tendency to run either larger or smaller than their European congeners. 

 The sinus between the lumbar and alvino spines is not circular, but dis- 

 tinctly angled ; Ehrenberg's figure of 8. brevispiiia, however, has a some- 

 what angled sinus. The shell is narrower than Gosse draws it and 

 has no bulge on the ventral surface just before the anterior opening, but 

 Ehrenberg's figure has not these characteristics. The most important 

 point of distinction is that the lumbar spine is a distinct spine, but this 

 varies, for in some it is as long as in 8. inaoracantha, and in others quite 

 short, though never as short as in 8. hrevispina. Had I not had this 

 species and S. hrevispina under the microscope at the same time, I should 

 have thought they were the same. It is as large as 8. maeracantha, but 

 the spines are not usually as long, they are never incurved, and the 



