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Show 260 ISLAND LIFK (PAR'r II. in Greenland but has not yet been noticed in North America. It is however so like the .American snipe (S. wilson·i), that a straggler might easily be overlooked. . Two small bats of N . .American species also occasiOnally reach the island, and these are the only wild mammalia except rats and mice. Insects of Bermuda.-Insects appear to be very scarce; but it is evident from the lists given by Mr. Jones that only the m~re conspicuous species have been yet collected. These compnse nineteen beetles, eleven bees and wasps, twenty-six butterflies and moths nine flies and the same number of Hemiptera, Orthoptera: and Neu~optera respectively. .All appear to be common North .American or West Indian species ; but until some competent entomological collector visits the islands it is impossible to say whether there are or are not any peculiar species. Land Mollusca.-The land-shells of the Bermudas are somewhat more interesting, as they appear to be the only group of animals except reptiles in which there are any peculiar species. The following list has been kindly furnished me by Mr. Thomas Bland of New York, who has made a special study of the terrestrial molluscs of the West Indian Islands. The species which are peculiar to the islands are indicated by italics. LIST OF THE LAND-SHELLS OF BEitli1UDA. 1. Succinea fulgens. (Lea.)... ... Also in Cuba. 2. , Bermudensis. (Pfeiffer.) , Barhadoes (?) 3. , margarita. (Pfr.) , Haiti. 4. Hyalina Berrnudensis. (Pfr.) ... A peculiar form, which, according to Mr. Binney, "cannot be placed in any recognised genus." A larger sub-fossil variety also occurs, named H. Nelsoni, by Mr. Bland, and which appears sufficiently distinct to be classed as another species. 5. ,, circurn.firrnata. (Redfield.) 6. , discrepans. (Pfr.) 7. Patula Reiniana. (Pf-r.) ... . .. 8. , hypolepta. (Shuttleworth.) Probably the same as P. rninuscula (Binney), a wide-spread American species. 9. Helix vortex. (Pfr.) ... Southern Florida and West Indies. ·CHAP. XII.] BERMUDA. 261 10. Helix microdonta. (Dcsh.) 11. , appressa. (Say.) ... 12. " pulchella. (Miill.) ... 13. " ventricosa. (Drap.) 14. Bulimulus nitidulus. (Pfr.) 15. Stenogyra octona. (Ch.) ... 16. Cionella acicula. (Mull.) ... 17. Pupa pellucida. (Pfr.) ... 18. , Barbadensis. (Pfr.) 19. , Jamaicensis. (C.D. Ad.) 20. Helicina convexa. (Pfr.) . . . Bahama Islands. ... Virginia and adjacent states; perhaps introduced into Bermuda. .. . Europe ; very close to H. rninuta (Say) of the United States. Introduced into Bermuda (?) ... Azores, Canary Islands, and South Europe. ... Cuba, Haiti, &c. ... West Indies and South America. ... Florida, New Jersey, and Europe. . .. West Indies, generally. . . . Barbadocs (?) ... Jamaica. ... Barbuda. Mr. Bland indicates only four species as certainly peculiar to Bermuda, and another sub-fossil species; while one or two of the rema1nder are indicated as doubtfully identical with those of other countries. We have thus at least one-fourth of the land-shells peculiar, while almost all the other productions of the islands are identical with those of the adjacent continent and islands. This corresponds, however, with what occurs generally in islands at some distance from continents. In the Azores only one land-bird is peculiar out of eighteen resident species; the beetles show about one-eighth of the probably non-introduced species as peculiar; the plants about one-twentieth; while the landshells have about half the species peculiar. This difference is well explained by the much greater difficulty of transmission over wide seas, in the case of land -shells, than of any other terrestrial organisms. It thus happens that when a species has once been conveyed it may remain isolated for unknown ages, and has time to become modified by local conditions unchecked by the introduction of other specimens of the original type. Flora of Bermuda.-Unfortunately no good account of the plants of these islands has yet been published. Mr. Jones, in his paper " On the Vegetation of the Bermudas " gives a list of no less than 480 species of flowering plants; but this number includes all the culinary plants, fruit-trees, and garden flowers, as well as all the ornamental trees and shrubs from various parts of the world which have been introduced, mixed up with the European and American weeds that have come with agricultural or garden seeds, and the really indigenous plants, in one |