;r&dii. Distinguished artists have judged them worthy of 

 representation on their canvas, and the voluptuous form 

 of Venus is seen supported on the waves by the valve of a 

 pecten, A beautiful species which inhabits a portion of 

 the Pacific is deified by the natives of some of the islands 

 iu that ocean. In catholic countries they are commonly 

 called Saint James' shells, and the pilgrims who visited the 

 shrine of St. James of Compostella, in Spain, were careful 

 to attach one or more to their dress, collected on the neigh- 

 bouring shore, where they abound. 



It is not a little surprising that although all the earlier 

 writers separated these shells from others as a natural 

 group, yet our great master Linne placed them in his ge- 

 nus Ostrea, notwithstanding the striking difference in the 

 structure of their animals, already indicated by Lister and 

 others. Bruguiere corrected this error and restored them 

 to the just rank of a separate genus, now universally ac- 

 knowledged. The family of Pectinides to which it be- 

 longs is composed of the genera Lima, Plagiostoma, Pe- 

 dum, Peclen, Hinnite, Plicatula, Spondylus and Podop- 

 sis. The latter is so nearly related to Spondylus, and Pla- 

 giostoma so closely resembles Lima that it has been pro- 

 posed to suppress them both, which would leave but six 

 genera. Sowerby insists that Hinnite cannot be a separate 

 genus, but must be reunited to pecten. Of these the three 

 first only are symmetrical, and furnished with a byssus. 

 The apices of Lima are distant and the auricles are simi- 

 lar in both valves. The ligament in Pedum is inserted in 

 a canaliform fosset on the inner face of the summits, pro- 

 longed into the interior. 



PI. 56. 



