368 Mr W. C. Trevclyan on live Marine CocMes. 



from the sea coast. Since that time, Mr Witham visited York- 

 shire, personally examined the spot, and actually found live tna- 

 rine cockles, in the situation already mentioned. We are still, 

 however, of opinion that the live cockles are not natives of the 

 bog ; and in this view we are borne out by the following state- 

 ment of Mr Trevelyan.— Ed.] 



JJ-AViNG lately been on a visit in Yorkshirej in the neighbour- 

 hood of the place where the marine cockles sent to Mr Witham 

 were said to have been found, I took advantage of the opportunity 

 to examine the spot, and to make inquiries concerning the fact. 

 The result is my thorough belief, that the cardium edule is 7iot 

 a native of the place, and that if specimens of it have been found 

 there, they have been put there by some absurd person, for the 

 purposing of hoaxing the individuals who sent the statement to 

 Edinburgh. 



The spot where they are said to have been is a peat-moss 

 resting on sand, through which drains have been cut. The te- 

 nant (Pratt) on whose farm part of the moss is situated, and 

 who has been there many years, when I questioned him, said 

 that he had seen cockles at different times in clearing out the 

 drains, and described them as being nearly the size of his thumb 

 nail, of the colour, and about the same thickness as the whelks^ 

 which are common in the ditches there, some of which he shewed 

 me, and which are fresh water helices (putris, &c.) ; that the 

 stripes were across the shell, from side to side, not in the same 

 direction as in the sea-cockle, which he said he knew well, but 

 had never seen any, or heard of any being found there, except- 

 ing those sent to Mr Witham. From this description, I wa.s 

 convinced that Pratt's cockles were the Tellina cornea ; the only 

 cockles I expected to find there, and of them, after a little search 

 in the ditches, I found some small specimens. They call them 

 cockles, from their analogy to the marine shells of that name, in 

 the same way as the helices are called whelks. 



The farm house called Cocklesbury stands on an elevation, a 

 short distance from the moss ; and may perhaps be named from 

 the cockles (Tellina) found there, though I think if it is from 

 shells at all that it derives its name, it is from the shells abund- 

 ant in the neighbouring limestone, some of which may perhaps 



