202
THE ESSEX NATURALIST.
Specimens from Coolmore, Co. Cork, are large, ovately tri-
gonal to ovate, but vary much because of the irregularity of
their growth ; massive, the laminae on the top being densely set
and with numerous narrow and usually close-set costae on the
lower valve, apparently continuous, as the growth lines are not
very prominent.
Deep-sea shells from Jersey are now scarce, and of great
beauty in their sculpture. One I had sent me by Mr. Sinel, of
that Island, is fully 5 inches in length, with a breadth of 53/4
inches, full-grown, and slightly thickened. The upper valve
is flat, the lamellae being finely imbricated and thin, the lower
valve deeply costated, rising where crossed by growth-lines into
tubular projections. As is the case with many of the Western
shells, the upper valve sinks into the lower one, due to the loss
of the horny matter projecting beyond the margin of the valves.
The shell, which is probably the same as the O. lamellosa
of Continental conchologists, grows to a full size, 51/2 inches by 5
inches, and compares with the Roussillon examples (Mediter-
ranean) figured in the memoir quoted above, and with the living
Mediterranean shells in my own possession, but I do not think
it is the species described by G. Brocchi, no authentic figure
having existed till 1897, when it was published by Sacco, many
years after Brocchi's death (Moll. Terr. Terz., pt. xxv., pl. ii.,
fig. 3). The need of an accurate figure of Brocchi's shell was
shown by the many species or forms that have been assigned
to it. It is not referred to by Deshayes (Lamarck) 1836, Carus,
Hidalgo, Monterosato, or Jeffreys directly. Cocconi and MM.
Bucquoy and his colleagues refer it to O. hippopus. Cerulli-
Irelli (Pal. Itat. xiii., pl. 3, fig. 4), figures a shell as O. edulis
var. lamellosa, which does not agree with the photo in Sacco
any more than this does with the shell given in Reeve, Conch.
Icon, vol. xviii., fig. 54 (Ostrea) which was identified as O.
lamellosa by Philippi direct. The shell marked as O. lamellosa
in the McAndrew Collection, Cambridge, has the laminae broad
and flat corresponding to the shell referred by Defrance to O.
cristata Lamarck (not Born). The absence of a typical figure
may have allowed free play in the views of different authors,
judging from those of Homes and Fontannes respectively. Ac-
cording to Monterosato (Ann. del Museo Civico, vol. vii., p. 2), it
is the O. ruscuriana of Lamarck, and should not be confounded