HELIX. 183 



cement mixed with the white of eg^. The latter eco- 

 nomical use might now be repeated with success, but by 

 a less cruel operation, viz. killing and pounding, instead 

 of pricking the snail, and straining the fluid. The 

 garden-snail is much more prolific than many of its con- 

 geners. Bouchard-Chantereaux mentions that he has 

 often counted from 100 to 110 eggs which had been 

 laid by a single individual. Brard noticed that they are 

 very sensible of cold, and hibernate early, clustering to- 

 gether in the crevices of old w^alls and trunks of trees, 

 and attached to each other by their membranous epi- 

 phragms or winter coverings. They make great havoc 

 in kitchen- gardens and spoil the 'best wall-fruit. There 

 is, however, some compensation for this mischief: a 

 kind of broth is made from them and used as a remedy 

 for pulmonary complaints. This kind of snail is occa- 

 sionally eaten by the French ; but it is not held by them 

 in the same estimation as the Apple-snail. Dr. Gray 

 says that the glassmen at Newcastle once a year have 

 a snail-feast, and that they generally collect the snails 

 themselves in the fields and hedges the Sunday before 

 the feast-day. They are supposed to have the power of 

 excavating holes in limestone rocks to form their winter 

 quarters. The late Dr. Buckland first called the atten- 

 tion of geologists to this circumstance ; and M. Bou- 

 chard-Chantereaux has lately published, in the ^Annales 

 des Sciences N-atureUes^ (4^ serie, p. 197-218), an article 

 entitled '^Observations sur les Helices saxicaves du Bou- 

 loiniais,'' which will well repay the trouble of a perusal. 

 By way of further illustrating the habits of our com- 

 mon garden-snail, I trust I may be excused in transfer- 

 ring to these pages a short poem by Cowper, which ought 

 to be known to all conchologists. It is called ^^The 

 Snail," and is as follows : — 



