SOLEN. RAZOR-SHELL. 
161 
6 ; Solen minutiis. Prickly Razor-shell. 
Mqntagu, pi. \.i.A—TVood y pi. 34. f. 5, 6. 
Mytilus pnveisus. Montagu, pi. 4. f. 2. 
Shell oblong or inclining to oval, dull white covered with 
a dirty brown shin, opake, striate and wrinkled trans¬ 
versely, truncate at the hinge end, and somewhat angu¬ 
larly truncate at the other, sometimes kidney-shaped; the 
valves no: quite equal, one of them projecting over the 
other at the front margin except at the hinge end ; each of 
them with two rows of erect spines runningfrom the beaks, 
one of them along the back margin, the other sloping in an 
oblique manner to the middle of the side margin, giving 
that part a somewhat angular edge : beaks close to the 
truncated end, prominent, pointed, with a broad impression 
on the abrupt slope under them j inside glossy white; in 
one valve a strong recurved obtuse tooth, in the other a 
smaller tooth, with a deep cavity by the side near the end : 
length sometimes nearly half an inch, and an inch in 
breadth. 
We have before us some dozens of these shells, from 
the tenth of an inch to an inch wide, collected both in En¬ 
gland and Ireland, from the roots of Fuci, Sertularue, and 
among masses of the Serpula tubularia; and can have no 
doubt in pronouncing, that the Mytilus pra?cisus cx Mon¬ 
tagu, and the Solen minutus, are specifically the same. 
The truncated hinge end with the deep impression under 
the beaks, and the angular opposite side, caused by the 
oblique ridge extending to the middle of the lateral margin, 
are strongly marked in them all: and those which Mon¬ 
tagu had considered as distinct, were such as had the teeth 
tod the dorsal spines obscure or obliterated, v. v. 
B. TFith the hinge nearly central , 7 to 13. 
7. Solenstrigiiatus. Currycomb Razor-shell. Fig. 53. 
Lister, pi. 416. f. 260— Wood, pi. 30. f. 1. 
Shell oblong, a little convex, white or reddish, covered 
with an oil-green skip, rounded at both ends, but a little 
narrowed at the cartilage side where it makes a slight slope 
along the back, strongly marked with oblique somewhat 
curved raised longitudinal lines for three-fourths of its 
p3 breadth. 
