British Conchology: Marine shells, comprising the remaining conchifera, the solenoconchia, and gasteropoda as far as littorinaJ. Van Voorst, 1865 |
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Common terms and phrases
angular angulated animal appears Barlee beaks BODY British broad brown Cailliaud Chiton ciliated cirri close-set coast colour conchologists convex Coralline Crag curved Deshayes dorsal margin dredged edges epidermis excavated foot Forbes fossil fringed front genus gills glossy Greenland HABITAT hinge hinge-plate inside Isles Lamarck Leach left valve limpet lines of growth Linné longitudinal Lovén M'Andrew mantle marked membranous Middendorff minute Mollusca mollusks Moray Firth mouth muscular scars nacreous narrow nearly North Africa Norvegica notched numerous obliquely oblong opaque operculum orifices outer lip oval pallets pallial scar palps papillæ Patella Philippi Pholas plates posterior end posterior side present species ribs ridge right valve Sars sculpture Sellius sheath shell Shetland shipworm short slight Solen sometimes specimens spiral spire striæ surface suture teeth tentacles Teredo thick thin Thracia triangular Trochus truncated tubercles tubes Turton umbilicus Unst upper variety whitish whorls wood yellowish-white young
Popular passages
Page 340 - Thro' his dim water-world ? 4. Slight, to be crush'd with a tap Of my finger-nail on the sand, Small, but a work divine, Frail, but of force to withstand, Year upon year, the shock Of cataract seas that snap The three-decker's oaken spine Athwart the ledges of rock, Here on the Breton strand...
Page 340 - The tiny cell is forlorn, Void of the little living will That made it stir on the shore. Did he stand at the diamond door Of his house in a rainbow frill ? Did he push, when he was uncurl'd, A golden foot or a fairy horn Thro
Page 340 - SEE what a lovely shell, Small and pure as a pearl, Lying close to my foot, Frail, but a work divine, Made so fairily well With delicate spire and whorl, How exquisitely minute, A miracle of design ! What is it ? a learned man Could give it a clumsy name.
Page 193 - Since the introduction of blankets by the Hudson's Bay Company, the use of these shells as a medium of purchase has to a great extent died out, the blankets having become the money, as it were, or the means by which everything is now reckoned and paid for by the savage. A. slave, a canoe, or a squaw is worth in these days so many blankets ; but it used to be so many strings of Dentalia...
Page 184 - All Nature widens upward. Evermore The simpler essence lower lies : More complex is more perfect, owning more Discourse, more widely wise.
Page 84 - Successive generations will occupy the same hole. The last inhabits the space between the valves of its predecessor. In this way four or five pairs of shells may be frequently seen nested one within the other, and not unusually a Sphenia Binghami in the centre of all. Cailliaud observed a Saxicava within a specimen of Venerupis Irus, which it had perforated.
Page 13 - ... not perpendicularly, but in a slanting direction at an angle of about 60 degrees. On the retreat of spring-tides, they may be seen nearly half out of their holes, apparently taking in a supply of oxygen for their gills. They are evidently sensible of vibratory movements in the air, as well as on ground, taking alarm at greater or less distances according to the state of the atmosphere and direction of the wind. When the Solen is disturbed it squirts out water in a strong jet ; and having thus...
Page 194 - The Tusk-shells are collected in the following manner: "An Indian when shell-fishing arms himself with a long spear, the haft of which is...
Page 148 - ... retract ; but on touching the smaller one they both were instantly drawn in. Indeed whenever they were retracted they always were drawn in together. When the worm was confined within the shell the orifice was not to be distinguished in the irregular surface of the wood, which was covered with small fuci. The worm appears commonly to bore in the direction of the grain of the wood, but occasionally it bores across the grain to avoid the track of any of the others ; and in some instances there was...
Page 205 - Some of the larger kinds, especially of Acanthopleura, are eagerly devoured by the lower orders in the West Indies, who have the folly to call them ' beef ; ' the thick fleshy foot is cut away from the living animal and swallowed raw, while the viscera are rejected. We have here a large pale Chiton, which is said to be poisonous.