OCR Text |
Show 1890.] MARINE MOLLUSCA OF ST. HELENA. 279 mella is different. It is very like E. aciculata, Pease, of which E. retrorsa, Sowerby, is a synonym. It differs in the following respects:-the lip is more sinuated above and more prominently curved below, the spire is rather less acutely produced, and the semipellucid zone beneath the suture is not so broad in proportion to the rest of the whorl beneath. EULIMA SUBCONICA. Eulima conica, Sowerby (non C. B. Adams), Conch. Icon. fig. 44. Both the figure and the description of this species are misleading, for Mr. Sowerby was careless, especially when engaged with small forms. He describes the last whorl as " angulated," and a decided angle is depicted in his figure. The type has a much less pronounced angulation ; the specimens from St. Helena are more like the figure, but still not quite so bulging at the periphery. The apical portion of the spire is sometimes straight, occasionally curves to the left, or, as in the type, turns to the right, not as drawn by Sowerby, who has reversed the direction. The aperture is neither " rather square " nor " acuminated beneathP It should have been described as obliquely oval and a trifle more acuminate above than below. The columella is not "rather tortuous f but slightly curved and reflexed over the umbilical region. Mr. Sowerby apparently drew a bad figure and then based his description upon it. There are thirteen whorls in the type, which is four and a half millimetres long. They are separated by a distinct suture, and the semipellucid margin, beneath it, occupies a little less than one-third of the whorl. The few uppermost are a trifle convex, the rest almost, but not quite, flat. The name conica was already in use for a Jamaican species of this genus, described by C. B. Adams in his ' Contributions to Conchology,' p. 110. His diagnosis applies very closely to the St. Helena specimens; but, as I have not a specimen of this species for comparison, I, for the present, prefer to consider them a distinct, but closely allied form, on which account I have proposed the name subconica. EULIMA GERMANA. (Plate XXIII. fig. 26.) Testa minima, nitida, pellucida, plus minus leviter arcuata ; anfractus 9, planiusculi, sutura distincta vix obliqua discreti; apertura ovata, superne acuminata, longit. totius \ subcequans labrum prominens, urcuatum ; columella obliqua, curvata, antice incrassata. Longit. 2\, diam. 1 millim. Of this very little species, two specimens were obtained by Capt. Turton, one somewhat more curved than the other. This same specimen also exhibits a continuous series of varices upon the right side. The pellucid zone beneath the suture in tbe penultimate whorl is about half as broad as the space between it and the top of the body-whorl. |