Pvn H,i I'UitlS

DONAX. 407
2. D. trun'culus *, Linne.
D. trunculus, Linn. Syst. Nat. p. 1127 (partly) ; F. & H. i. p. 338.
Body pale yellowish-white : tubes rather long, cylindrical,
thick, and smooth but lineated ;
branched :
cirri of the alimentary tube
foot compressed, lanceolate, sinuous. (Poli.)
Shell distinguishable from that of D. vittatus by the follow-
ing characters :— it is acutely rather than obtusely triangular,
more inequilateral and bright-looking : the longitudinal stria?
are finer and less impressed, and there are no transverse or
concentric stria? : the
colour is usually olive, blended with
chestnut and variegated by numerous white rays, or yellow
with chestnut rays, sometimes orange outside and flamecolour
within, or milk-white : the posterior margin is more or less
abruptly truncate, and not sloping gradually to a blunt point :
the umbones are more prominent : the lateral teeth are much
less developed, and often rudimentary or indistinct : and the
inner margin is quite smooth below the ligament, instead of
being notched or crenulated as in I), vittatus. It attains a
larger size than that species, although my British specimen is
only -p^ths °f an incn l°n © an^ ^ncn broad.
lyiJ
Habitat :
Only one specimen
Exmonth
(Clark) ; Torbay (Battersby).
was obtained in each of these lo-
calities, mixed with the other species. It occurs in the
Red Crag (S. Wood), and also in the Italian tertiaries
(Brocchi and Philippi). South of Great Britain it is
universally diffused, from the coasts of Brittany (De
Gerville and Collard des Cherres) to Gibraltar (M fAn-
drew) and throughout the Mediterranean, iEgean
(Forbes), and Red Sea (Von Hemprich and Ehrenberg),
both littoral and at depths varying from 2 to 30 fa-
thoms.
This may be the Senegal shell-fish named " Pamet "
by Adanson, and which he says the negroes cook and
eat, believing
that it acts as a laxative. We are told bv
Poli that in his time there was no better kind of shell-
fish sold at Naples, either for making sauces or season-
* Having a small piece cut off.