48 OKHAMANDAL MARINE ZOOLOGY PART II 



sandal-wood and other sweet-smelling incense material used in coating the incense sticks 

 burned before shrines, or used in native shops. In Tamil these sticks go by the names 

 of uthupaththi or sambiranik-kuchchi ; the best quality sells at the rate of 1 or 2 for 

 3 pies, while inferior sorts retail at from J to 1 pie each. The operculum itself is called 

 naganam or navanam ; the usual rate is 2 annas per palam ( = 8 tolas or just over 3 oz.). 



(p) ASSEMBLY CALLS, ETC. 



A call on a chank-shell is frequently employed upon native-owned plantations in 

 South India and Ceylon to summon the workpeople to their duties : there can be no 

 doubt that these long drawn out and penetrating booming calls are particularly well 

 adapted to this purpose. 



In the Laccadive Islands all the inhabitants are required under penalty to attend 

 the call of the chank, sounded in cases of emergency and public requirement. Among 

 these are counted the beaching of boats and the inauguration of rat hunts. 



To conclude this account of the miscellaneous uses to which the chank is put and of 

 which the foregoing summary has by no means exhausted the list, the following 

 instance of the ingenuity of the Indian countryman may not be amiss. For it I am 

 indebted to Mr. C. A. Innes, I.C.S. Apropos of a flight of winged termites, he told me 

 that once when travelling in the Madura district, he chanced upon a low caste man 

 engaged upon some mysterious work on a large termite anthill : the man had a chank- 

 shell in his hand. When asked what he was doing, he replied, " I am catching white 

 ants to eat," and gave a blast upon the chank at one of the major openings into the hill. 

 Hardly had he finished ere crowds of ants sallied forth from other openings, and these 

 the man scooped up in handfuls and ate without any preparation. 



