60 
MYTILUS Brardii. 
TAB. DXXXII.— /g. 2. 
Spec. Char. Convex, straight, pear-shaped, elon- 
gated ; beaks acute, terminal (within each 
beak a plate is extended to the opposite edge 
for the support of a tendon, and within that is 
a flat angular process). 
Syn. Mytilus Brardii. Faujas , Ann. du Mus . 8, 
t. 58./. 11 $ 12? Brongn. Ter. du Vicentin. 
78. t . 6. /. 14?* Basterot , Mem . de la Soc . 
d’Hist. Nat. 2. Part 1, 78. 
A rather variable shell, its surface being generally 
convex with an approach to keel-shaped near the pointed 
beaks. Specimens from Dax are often sharply keeled 
for nearly half their length, and the rest is antiquated. 
The plate which extends across the cavity within each 
beak, bears a small muscular impression, analogous to 
that upon the surface near the beak in most other 
Mussels. The only other species that has a similar sup- 
port for the attachment of the smaller muscle or tendon, 
whichever it may be, is the Freshwater one, M. poly- 
morphus, found in the Danube and most of the rivers 
in the north of Europe, and lately in the Commercial 
Docks and Surry Canal, near London ; and a small one 
often brought from the coasts of Africa (M. murinus ? 
of Gmel.). The former is well distinguished by its curved 
very deep keel-shaped valves, and by having in general 
an irregular thin septum within and parallel to the 
* The figures given by Faujas and Brongniart are both un- 
satisfactory. 
