TELLINA. TELLEN. 
167 
with mostly a stain of yellowish-ferruginous which is 
deeper towards the pointed end; sometimes it has ablueish 
cast, and is often polished like fine enamel between the la¬ 
minar ridges; inside white, polished, with the margin very 
thin and plain: hinge nearer one end : teeth very strong 
and prominent, in one valve a single tooth between two hol¬ 
lows ; in the other two ; lateral ones none in either valve : 
length an inch ; breadth, nearly an inch and a half. 
The teeth differ much in different specimens : sometimes 
the single tooth is rather triangular, and notched ; some¬ 
times broad, and a little recurved, like the tooth of a Mya ; 
often placed obliquely transverse, or with a projection on 
one side, having the appearance of a smaller one attached 
to it: the two teeth in the other valve are sometimes broad 
and diverging, sometimes round and a little recurved ; but 
til are uniformly very strong and projecting beyond the 
edge of the shell. 
Found in great abundance imbedded in the blue clay be¬ 
low the village of Clontarf, near Dublin; in Valentia bay, 
and Bantry bay. v. m. 
2. Teliina pusilla. Minute Tcllen. 
lister, pi. 159. f. 15. 
Shell somewhat oval, very convex, thin, brittle, transpa¬ 
rent, whitish or yello wish-white, but generally covered with 
a rough extraneous coat, with sometimes a red spot about 
the hinge, probably occasioned by the dead inhabitant, re¬ 
gularly and closely striate transversely; inside white or 
daU yellowish-white: hinge not quite central, with two 
primary teeth in one valve, in the other a single very minute 
on? which is not always discoverable; the lateral teeth 
prominent, pointed, double in one valve only: length a 
line ; breadth rather more. 
This is most probably the minute species mentioned by 
Montagu, p. 88. We have compared multitudes of them 
with the young both of T. cornea, and T. amnica: from 
iiie first they differ in being more oval convex and transpa¬ 
rent, in being more regularly striate: from T. amnica in 
not being so much produced nor truncate, in the much 
greater convexity, and in the color, which in the latter is 
always of a blueiqh cast both inside and out, and in the 
teeth. 
