LAMELLIBRAN CHI ATA. 
337 
Mr. Hyndman), on the Antrim and Down coasts, chiefly from a muddy 
bottom. I have met with it in the stomachs of different species of diving 
ducks, as well as occasionally in flat-fish, as sole, &c. Dredged in Clew, 
Clifden, and Killery Bays, 3 — 12 fathoms, in 1840. 
N. tenuis, Mont. 
Portmarnock, near Dublin, Mr. Warren. 
JY. nitida, Sow. 
Dundalk, Portmarnock, and Youghal. 
N. minuta, Mont. 
“ One valve in Dublin Bay,” Brown. “ West of Ireland; rare,” Turt. 
C. D. p. 11. A scarce and deep-water species ; Portrush, Mr. Hyndman. 
Dredged in Belfast Bay in a few instances, but rarely more than a few odd 
valves ; obtained there from 23 fathoms (shelly sand) by the gentleman 
just named; who likewise dredged it from 50 fathoms off South Rock, 
Co. Down. Portmarnock, Mr. Warren. 
N. Polii, Phil. 
Mr. M‘Andrew informs me that he dredged “ some very young shells 
in May, 1848, near the Nymph Bank, at from 50 to 60 fathoms, and 
about as many miles from the Old Head of Kinsale, on the course from 
the Land’s End. In June, similar specimens were dredged from 40 
fathoms between Mizen Head and Cape Clear, about twenty miles off the 
land.” Dublin Bay, Messrs. Clark and Warren. 
Family Mytilid^:. 
Genus Mytilus. 
M. edulis, Linn. 
Gregarious ; hab. between low and high water mark. Young densely 
covering over delicate sea-weeds, looking like strings of beads — so close 
together are they that they must either die for want of room or shift 
their quarters. 
M. edulis , Linn., var. incurvatus. The only bivalve seen on Tory Island, 
where it is abundant, covering the rocks ; observed by Mr. Hyndman. 
Mytilus pellucidus, Pen. Don., vol. iii. pi. 81, also of Thorpe, fig. frontis- 
piece. 
Turt. B. Biv., p. 197, pi. 15. 
Common in some parts of Belfast Bay. 
Mussels. March 8, 1843. Captain MTHbben tells me, that on a buoy 
(11 feet in diameter at the base) in Belfast Bay, cleaned after being five 
years “ down,” the entire circumference of the base for a foot of space 
always under water, was covered a foot thick with full-grown mussels ; 
he thinks there could not have been less than half a ton of them taken off 
the buoy. The bases of these buoys in our bay become at once covered 
with mussels ; those one year down, on being examined, are covered with 
them of about half the full-grown size, and those two years down do not, 
he thinks, display them of full size. I mention this with regard to the age 
of mussels. The mussels on the buoys are considered of a very superior 
quality, and have the great advantage of being quite free from sand, the 
water washing round them, keeping them quite pure. 
Dec., 1844. The buoy noticed under date of March 8, 1843, after being 
cleaned and covered with tar, was again put down : on being taken up 
