42 MOLLUSCA THEIR USE TO SAVAGE NATIONS. 



It is the same mth many savage nations. They either 

 habitually live on mollusca, which afford them their main 

 supply, or they resort to them when the fruit season has 

 past, or when the trees have failed in their usual productive- 

 ness. Thus from the particulars scattered through the re- 

 lations of Cook, Freycinet, and Beechy, the conclusion is 

 forced upon us that the natives of Australia derive their 

 principal subsistence from this source. Wherever marks 

 of fire were observed there the shells of oysters, cockles, 

 mussels, and various other bivalves, robbed of their contents, 

 were strewed around, and sometimes in numbers scarcely 

 credible. They apparently eat none of them in a raw state, 

 nor do they always go on shore to dress them, for they have 

 frequently fires in tlieir canoes for that purpose. " In CaH- 

 fornia," says Captain Beechy, " mussels are found in con- 

 siderable quantities upon the shores, and form a large portion 

 of the food of the Indians bordering upon the coasts and 

 rivers. At Monterey two species of Haliotis of large size 

 are also extremely abundant, and equally sought after by 

 the Indians. They are found on the granite rocks forming 

 the south-east part of the bay, which appears to be their 

 northern limit. The natives make use of these shells for 

 ornaments, and decorate their baskets with pieces of them."* 

 To the people of Terra del Fuego shell-fish are every thing. 

 Captain Cook saw no appearance of their having any other 

 food; "for, though seals were frequently seen near the 

 shore, they seemed to have no implements for taking them. 

 The shell-fish are collected by the women, whose business 

 it seems to be to attend, at low water, with a basket in one 

 hand, a stick pointed and barbed in the other, and a satchel 



is no fairer and more profitable sands for cokills in all the world.' The 

 cokills still preserve their good character, and, unlike many good things, 

 appear to have conducted themselves peaceably, according to the laws which 

 regulate the increase of a thriving population." " It is not easy to calculate," 

 says Mr. Wilson, " the amount of such beds of shell-fish, but we may men- 

 tion that, during a period of great distress which prevailed a good many 

 years ago, all the families in the island (then about two hundred in number) 

 resorted, for the sake of this food, to the great sands at the northern end of 

 Barra. It was computed that, for a couple of summers at the time alluded 

 to, no less than from one hundred to two hundred horse-loads were taken at 

 low water every day of the spring-tides during the months of May, June, 

 July, and August. We were pleased to hear it observed that the shell-fish 

 are always most abundant in years of scarcity." — Voi/. round the Coasts of 

 Scotland, i. 460. — In North Uist, cockles of equal size and most delicate 

 flavour are found abundantly, and aft'ord an unfailing source of food to the 

 people. — Ibid. i. 445. 



* Voy. to the Pacific, &c., ii, 83. See also p. 74, and vol. i. 33 : and Home's 

 Lect. on Comp. Anat. v. 358. Haliotis tuberculata is commonly eaten in 

 Guernsey and Jersey. 



