11 
AXINUS- 
Gen. Char. A free equalvalved, transverse, 
bivalve ; anterior side very short ; posterior 
side produced, truncated, with a lunette 
near the beaks : hinge with a long oblique 
ligament placed in a furrow. 
The regular lunette, and the extremely short anterior 
side, with the hinge cartilage extended along' almost 
the whole of its edge, seem to point out this as a 
distinct genus, and it is much to be regretted that there 
is very little probability of discovering the interior struc- 
ture of the hinge, but l suspect it has no teeth. The 
shell appears to be thin, but I can trace neither the 
cicatrices of the muscles, nor of the edge of the mantle 
in the angulatus , which ! consider the type of the genus. 
The name,* and indeed the genus itself, cannot be 
considered as well established, until more is known 
respecting the shells included under it : a bad name is 
however better than none. 
AXINUS angulatus, 
TAB. CCCXV. 
Spec. Char. Obovate, subhexangular ; pos- 
teriorly cuneiform, surface subbicarhiated ; 
beaks small, recurved. 
A depressed shell, whose greatest length is nearly 
perpendicular to the hinge cartilage ; the base (front) 
rounded terminated at each end by an angle from which 
two obtuse keels run up to the beaks ; the anterior keel 
is sharpest, near to and almost parallel with the lunge : the 
posterior keel is very obtuse, from it to near the lunette 
the surface is almost flat, but just upon its border the 
shell rounds with an obtuse angle upon its edge : the 
lunette is impressed, ovate, pointed, and curved. 
Found in the London Clay, near the White Conduit, 
House at Islington ; and by Mr. Gibbs in clay brought 
up from a well in the road from Vauxhali to Wands- 
worth, generally tilled with Pyrites. 
* Taken from the hatchet-like form cl the posterior side. 
