Zoological Illustrations Series II/Plate 109



In a popular work like this, we wish to consult the taste of the amateur, no less than of the philosophic naturalist; and with this object we have delineated a beautiful variety, having the aperture rose colour, of the Murex imperialis already figured at pl. 67 of our second volume. It was then in the possession of Messrs. Stuchbury, and was nearly the only one, among very many of the usual orange-mouthed specimens, which came to their hands.

We have already intimated that the series of types in this genus, (see pl. 100) besides possessing innumerable analogies in the class Mollusca, exhibits a most singular one with the series of vertebrated animals; four of which can be traced by comparing them with four of the classes of the vertebrated circle. Commencing with Phyllonotus, we may call them, from the hideous and repulsive aspect of many of the species, the Reptile type, as the name given to one (Murex scorpio), sufficiently intimates. In the tooth-like spines of Murex tenuispinosus we see some resemblance to the teeth of quadrupeds: the Murex haustellum has been well compared to the head of a snipe, while in the fin shaped varices of Murex pinnatus, we have a representation of the fish. If the analogy between Centronotus and the Amphibia cannot be traced, it is because the latter has so few forms; but the Hedgehogs, which represent the Amphibia in the circle of Quadrupeds, are again represented under the form of a shell, in the sub-genus Centronotus. These analogies, however remote are unquestionably natural, because they follow each other in a uniform series.