LAND SNAILS. 
101 
species is very thin, depressed and compressed, 
composed of three whorls : the last one is large. 
The aperture is oval, with a thin edge. There is 
no umbilicus. The breadth is about one-fourth 
of an inch, and the height one-twelfth and a half. 
It varies in colour and shape. The green trans¬ 
parency gives place to a white opacity in dead 
shells that have been long exposed. 
The little Vitrince are thorough gourmands; 
their appetite never fails them. These little 
snails feed on mosses and fallen leaves; vege¬ 
table substances in a state of decomposition 
are preferred by them. But it must not be sup¬ 
posed that they are exclusively vegetarians; on 
the contrary, they are often carnivorous, and not 
only satisfy their hunger with dead prey, but 
even with living prey. The observations made 
upon this little species by M. le Dr. Baudon are 
very curious and interesting. He writes, in his 
“ Catalogue des Moll, de TOise,” 1862 : “I placed 
a great number of individuals under a bell-glass 
with other mollusks, taking care to provide them 
with rocks, leaves, and mosses, upon which they 
lived. One of the Yitrines attacked and devoured 
a Helicella cellaria ; two Zonites candiclissimus , 
killed by their bites, were devoured in two days. 
.I then placed under the glass a piece of 
raw mutton, of the size of a hazel-nut; five 
minutes had not elapsed, when the Yitrines in the 
