Sea Shells 
of New 
Zealand 
Plate IIT 
No.7 
Plate III 
No. 6 
Plate III 
No.9 
Hauraki Gulf, and dredged at the East Cape in twenty 
fathoms. 
SIPHONALIA DILATATA (siphon a hollow tube, a 
reed; dilatata, dilated).—A solidly-built large spiral uni- 
valve, one of the Spindle shells, sculptured with numerous 
fne raised brown ribs or lines, varying in thickness, spir- 
ally winding round the whorls. The shoulders of the 
whorls are angled, and bear rather large nodules. The in- 
terior is greenish in colour, the mouth angled at the shoul- 
der, channelled above, and terminating below in a rather 
long canal. It is about five inches in length, and found in 
rocky situations. 
Bay of Islands; Mount Maunganu. 
SIPHONALIA MANDARINA (siphon, a hollow tube, 
a reed; mandarin, a Chinese dignitary)—This Spindle 
shell is somewhat similar to the last one, but of more slen- 
der and graceful proportions. It is of a greyish greenish 
or purplish stone colour, with fine raised spiral cords and 
lines; the whorls are not angled, but well rounded, and 
the canal at the base of the aperture is long, open, and 
curved to the left. In perfect and half-grown specimens 
the protoconch is conspicuous, and of a waxen white. I 
have seen this species suspended from the lower end of a 
large cluster of egg-capsules, attached to the under surface 
of a overhanging rock, and about a foot above the level 
of the water at a low spring tide. Among the surround- 
ing boulders, shells of all sizes can be obtained at different 
seasons of the year, so that it is possible in time to form 
an instructive series ranging from about three-sixteenths 
of an inch, consisting of protoconch and body whorl only, 
up to the full-grown specimen of five inches, comprising 
nine or ten whorls. 
Auckland; Mount Maunganui; Banks Peninsula; 
Queen Charlotte Sound. | 
SIPHONALIA NODOSA (siphon, a hollow tube; no- 
dosa, with nodes)—A somewhat thin, translucent brown 
and white shell, each whorl sloping down to the shoulder, 
then becoming vertical down to the suture, where it meets 
and joins the next whorl below. At the point of the 
shoulder there is a row of small and sharp nodules winding 
spirally round the shell from the apex to the aperture: 
the body whorl being ornamented with two; the second 
one at the lower border of the broad brown-colour band. 
About two and a-half inches high. It is common on sandy 
beaches, and is found throughout New Zealand, “as far 
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