902 OYSTERS, AND ALL ABOUT THEM. 



some small, some mere spat, are attached to the bottom 

 and opposite side of the bottle. 



Another engraving, in the same paper, represents an 

 ancient Chinese teapot without a spout, but perforated at 

 the spot from which it once projected by three small ori- 

 fices, like those of a crow-quill, which, being at some time 

 at the bottom of the sea, became the abode of an oyster, 

 either washed into it in the state of spat, or at some sub- 

 sequent stage of its progress. In this strange abode the 

 oyster lived and grew, deriving its subsistence from the 

 water that flowed in through the orifices. 



Its dwelling too became a prison, for the mouth of the 

 teapot was tightly and closely plugged up by the lower 

 valve of the shell. This part rose abruptly from a lower 

 flat margin, extending disc-like or ring-like within the 

 vessel, to its swollen circumference, or nearly so ; hence 

 the escape of the oyster was impossible, as this substance 

 fitted the mouth of the teapot like a bung. Its surface is 

 transversely marked with lines, the result of growth, and 

 with longitudinal ridges and furrows. It consists of many 

 layers of lime, placed one upon another, to the thickness 

 of half an inch ; the whole appearing as if the oyster, 

 clothed in a shell of thick putty or liquid plaster of Paris, 

 had tried to break through its prison-house by pressing 

 upwards, and had thereby converted its shell into a plug, 

 so as to block itself in, the putty or plaster becoming har- 

 dened. Such is, at least, the appearance, though not the 

 fact, for the growth and adaptation of form kept pace with 

 each other. This singular dwelling was dredged up in 

 Falmouth River, and is (or was) in the possession of Mr. 

 Payne, of Blackheath. 



The naturalist by whom this specimen was described 

 mentions an instance in which three oysters, at an early 



