236 THE DISPERSAL OF SHELLS. 



" This snail is not indigenous, or originally a native of 

 these kingdoms-, but a natundized species, that has throve 

 so well as now to be found in very great quantities. It 

 was first imported to us from Italy about the middle of 

 last century, by a scavoir vivre, or Epicure, as an an [sic] 

 article of food. Mr. ^;/^;tj' informs us, it was a Charles 

 Hoiuard, Esq., of the Arundel family, who, on that 

 account, scattered and dispersed those snails all over 

 the downs, and in the woods, etc., at Albury, an antient 

 seat of that noble family, near AsJited, BoxJnll, Barking, 

 and EbbisJiam or Epsom, in Surry, where they have 

 thriven so much that all that part of the county, even to 

 the confines of wSz/i'j'tu', abounds with them ; insomuch 

 that they are a nusance, and far surpass in numbers the 

 common, or any other species of English snails. 



" The Epicures, or scavoir vivre^ of those days, followed 

 this luxurious folly, and the snails were scattered or 

 dispersed throughout the kingdom, but not with equal 

 success ; neither have records transmitted to posterity 

 the /^///^ of those worthies equal to the Roman Fulvius 

 Hirpinus, except of tivo, the one Sir Kenelm Digby, who 

 dispersed them about Gothurst, the seat of that family 

 (now of the Wrights) near Newport Pagnel, in Bucking- 

 hamshire, where probably they did not thrive much, as 

 they are not very frequent thereabout : the o'&i^x ivorthy 

 was a Lord Hatton, recorded by Mr. Morton, who scat- 

 tered them in the coppices at his seat at Kirby, in 

 Noj'thamptonshire, where they did not succeed. 



" Dr. Lister iow'Ci^. them about Puckeridge and Ware, in • 

 Hertfordshire; and observes they are abundant in the 



