Seashell

“ Some live on the surface of the water, some burrow in sand or mud, and some bore holes for themselves in the softer rocks. Some live in deep water; but the better coloured shells are found near low water mark, or in shallow water; for light is as necessary to the perfecting of colour in shells as in flowers. Shells that have grown in a harbour are more fragile than those grown in the ocean, and are usually less brilliant in colour, as harbour water is not as clean as ocean water. ”

“ The color-patterns of the shell vary to a wonderful degree. The young shell has a thin epidermis, a sharp lip to the aperture and a more or less prominent spire, the rolled over and toothed lip and polished surface not being acquired until fully adult. No more beautiful sight can be imagined than one of these gorgeous animals, as seen through the clear water, crawling over the sandy bottom or on the branch of some coral. ”

“ And by and by we reach the sea, and there we find masses of tangled seaweed, the plants of the salt water, while all along the shores myriads of living creatures are left by the receding tide. In the rocky pools we find active life busily at work. Thousands of tiny acorn shells, scarcely larger than the head of a good-sized pin, cover the rocks and fling out their thread-like arms in search of food. ”

“ May not man cast his shell with as little offense as the mussel, and it, perchance, be a precious relic to be kept in the cabinets of the curious? May we not amuse ourselves with it, as when we count the layers of a shell, and apply it to our ear, to hear the history of its inhabitant in the swells of the sea, the pulsation of the life which once passed therein still faintly echoed? We confess that it was well done in Nature thus to let out her particles of lime to the mussel and coral, to receive them back again with such interest. ”

“ Everyone who has spent a little time in naturalising on the shore, has noticed how often you may find univalve shells, such as those of the whelk and periwinkle, with the top of the shell knocked off. This is nearly always the case with the dead shells that you find strewn along the tide-line; and after a storm, on a rocky coast, you may find shells that still contain the living tenant, in the same sad condition. And you may also meet not infrequently with shells, dead or living, that bear evidence of the owners' efforts to repair them after an accident to the spire. ”

“ The shell is shaped something like that of a whelk, but is very smooth and porcelain-like, and is generally white, ornamented with several coloured bands. It is, however, one of the most variable of shells, differing not only in colour but in form. It always inhabits the belt of the shore between tide-marks, and preys upon other Molluscs, such as the mussel and periwinkle, literally licking them to pieces with its long riband tongue. ”

“ They are unprovided with shells except in the earliest stages of their existence, when they dwell in a minute nautiloid shell, furnished with an operculum, both of which are subsequently cast off. Unfortunately the colours of these beautiful creatures cannot be preserved after death, and therefore a small series of glass models is exhibited, which will give some idea of their great variety in form and colouring. They are found in most parts of the world, chiefly in shallow water, but a few species live upon floating seaweed in the open sea. ”

“ One of the commonest examples is the oyster shell; if broken across it will be seen to consist of very thin plates, or laminæ, as they are termed, closely packed together. The thinner these laminæ may be the more lustrous and beautiful appears the lining of the shell; that shifting play of colours which we call iridescent, from iris—the rainbow, is then brightest and most noticeable. A very remarkable substance is this mother-of-pearl; smooth, and shining, and delicately-tinted. Who would expect to find such a beautiful lining to the rugged, rough, dingy-looking oyster, or mussel shell? ”

“ The popular names of ‘shells,’ ‘shell-fish,’ and the like, as commonly applied to the Mollusca, the intrinsic beauty and grace of the shells themselves, resulting in the passion for their collection, their durability and ease of preservation, as compared with the non-testaceous portion,—all these considerations tend to unduly exalt the value of the shell as part of the organism as a whole, and to obscure the truth that the shell is by no means the most important of the organs. ”

“ The finest collections of shells, however, are to be made at the sea-side, for the marine mollusca are both more varied in kind and more abundant than the land and fresh-water ones, and quite an extensive collection may be made in the course of an afternoon's ramble along the shore; it is necessary, however, to carefully reject such specimens as are worn by having been rolled by the waves upon the beach, as they are not of any great value in a collection; it is better, in fact, if possible, to go down to the rocks at low water and collect the living specimens. ”

“ The frost and rain of the past winter have washed away the sand and light soil which had hidden them. Why! these are shells, not pebbles. Stone shells, fossil shells! See how perfect every delicate fluting is, how sharply the hinge of the long-perished bivalve is defined. Some are of a delicate pale gray, others almost white; but long ago in the Silurian seas perhaps they shone in brown and yellow, red, pink, buff, and maroon, as gaily as the scallop shells of to-day, which in shape they much resemble.
What is this lump of stone covered with little star-shaped knobs? ”

“ Yes, my dear, a fish has lived in each of these little shells. I have sometimes picked them up on the beach with the fish in them; but they are generally washed on shore when the sea is rough, and the fish dies and falls out of the shell before it is picked up; as fish, you know, cannot live out of the water. Some day I will show you a very beautiful shell, which I have in my cabinet; it is the shell of the paper nautilus, which is a very curious little fish. ”

“ Beads made of pieces of fresh-water and marine shells are found among the other remains. Sometimes pieces are cut from the mussel-shell, rubbed round, and then a hole bored. Sometimes specimens of Melania or Paludina holes bored near the aperture, and were then used as beads. The beads made of marine shells show that some system of barter or commerce existed with the Atlantic Ocean or the Gulf. Quantities of shells, of species of the genus Unio, "fresh-water oysters," are found. They go to show that shell-fish formed an article of diet of the race. ”

“ It is a clean, bright little shell, upwards of an inch across. Those in the ocean are lighter in colour, and larger and more solid than those found in harbours. As the tide falls in harbours, they conceal themselves near low water mark, especially in the vicinity of marine grass banks. When the tide is rising on a warm, sunny day they spring out of the sand, dropping sometimes two or three inches from where they had been concealed. The operculum is horny, with a shelly outer layer ”

“ When live shells, as they are called, that is having the living fish in them, are obtained, the best plan is to place them in spirits of wine, this at once deprives the inhabitant of life, without injuring the shell, which should then be placed in hot water for a time, the body of the mollusk is thus rendered firm, and may be removed by means of some pointed instrument; care should be taken to leave no portion of animal matter within, or after a while it will become putrid and give out a stain, which will show through and injure the delicate markings of the shell ”

“ If we take a peep through a microscope, under the direction of a naturalist named Rymer Jones, we shall see that “the shell of an Oyster is a world occupied by an innumerable quantity of animals, compared to which the Oyster itself is a colossus. The liquid enclosed between the shell of the Oyster contains a multitude of embryos, covered with transparent scales, which swim with ease; a hundred and twenty of these embryos, placed side by side, would make an inch in breadth. ”

“ CONTENTS OF SHELL-MOUND.
The third shell in order, in this bank of shells, is the mussel, and then the cockle,—all edible. “There is evidence enough in these mounds,” says Dr. Gordon, “to show that they have been the work of man, and not the effect of any tidal current, or any other natural cause. The shell-fish which the remains represent are, with scarcely an exception, edible, and continue to be eaten to this day. In all deposits by the sea, there is abundance of species that have ever been rejected as food. The shells are full-grown, or adult shells. ”

“ At Iquique (lat. 20° 12′ S.) , in a great accumulation of sand, at a height estimated between one hundred and fifty and two hundred feet, I observed many large sea-shells which I thought could not have been blown up by the wind to that height. Mr. J. H. Blake has lately [25] described these shells: he states that “inland toward the mountains they form a compact uniform bed, scarcely a trace of the original shells being discernible; but as we approach the shore, the forms become gradually more distinct till we meet with the living shells on the coast.” ”

“ Most usually he walks about at the bottom of the sea on his long arms, something like the Cuttle-fish, feeding on the marine vegetation; the shell is then uppermost; if we could look inside of it we should see numerous little chambers or cells, the larger and outermost of which only are inhabited by the mollusk, the others being filled with air render the whole light and buoyant. ”

“ Many a living shell has an epidermis, the same as an animal, while a dead shell has none.
When shells are obtainable, who can resist the impulse to gather them? The man, woman, or child who is proof against the seductive powers of the beautiful and many-colored shells of the seashore "is fit for treason, stratagems, and spoils." Next to the pleasure of collecting shells one's self is that of witnessing the keen delight of children and ladies in gathering these beautiful treasures of the sea. ”

“ Many of these will be worn by their daily encounter with the tide, and some will be pierced with small round holes too neatly ground to have been made by accident. These holes give you a hint as to why this shell is empty for they are the work of a band of little pirates which live by boring into their neighbours and sucking their life-blood. Many of the dead shells are those of animals which live far out at sea or in the deep water and have been washed ashore when the tide was high. ”

“ Then there are coral islands in the Pacific Ocean, whole platforms of solid coral which shut in portions of quiet water in some places.
The little corals themselves do not work in deep water, nor above the surface of the sea. But the bony substance spreads and spreads, up, down, and across the sea. And as many shell-fish eat into coral, great quantities of fine coral-sand sink to the bottom, making a nice white carpet for the fishes to glide over. Folks do not take coral from the sea at any time but during the months you call April, May, and June. ”

“ Now there is a very common shell, the little yellow periwinkle, which has practically done away with its spire, the coils of the shell being so curved that the earlier part of the spire [22] does not project beyond the later-formed coils, and the whole shell has a rounded outline. This little creature lives on the long seaweeds which grow at low-water mark or near it; and when the sea is rough it is obviously liable to be dashed from its foothold on the seaweed and flung violently down, as the huge seaweeds sway about in the shallow waves. ”

“ On the decay of upraised sea-shells.—I have stated that many of the shells on the lower inclined ledge or terrace of San Lorenzo are corroded in a peculiar manner, and that they have a much more ancient appearance than the same species at considerably greater heights on the coast of Chile. I have, also, stated that these shells in the upper part of the ledge, at the height of eighty-five feet above the sea, are falling, and in some parts are quite changed into a fine, soft, saline, calcareous powder. ”

“ The univalves were shells in one piece, such as the whelk; the bivalves those in two pieces, such as the mussel or oyster; and the multivalves those in more than two pieces, such as barnacles or chitons, barnacles, however, being no longer classed with shells.
The highest of the five types, or natural divisions, of animals are the Vertebrata, the Mollusca, and the Annulosa. The vertebrates usually have vertebrae, or jointed backbones, and from this the highest division takes its name; but the real test is the colour of the blood, which in the vertebrates is always red. ”

“ Some or other of the members of this class are well known to everybody, if only in the shape of toothsome food—the Prawn, the Shrimp, the Lobster, the Crayfish, and the Crab. The great characteristic of this class of the Arthropod phylum is the so-called ‘shell,’ which differs greatly from true shell in being composed of chitine, hardened with salts of lime. Most of the species live in the water and breathe by means of gills or through the skin. In dealing with these creatures, some long words must be employed, if our present work on them is to be a stepping-stone to something more advanced. ”

“ Where the waves are rough, and rocks superabundant, then the shell is rough, hard, stony, fit to weather anything; where only smooth water and halcyon days are to be looked for, Nature, which never works in vain, provides but paper sides and an egg-shell boat, such as the little nautilus navigates and tacks and steers in. ”