WENTLETRAPS. 195 
the Precious Wentletrap or Royal Staircase (Sca- 
laria pretiosa), a large shell, twisted into a loose, 
untouching spiral, of a pale yellow hue, ornamented 
with ribs of pure white. ‘This is always a prized 
addition to a cabinet, for it is undoubtedly a shell 
of extraordinary beauty ; but the value which was 
attached to it in former years can only be considered 
as a phase of insanity, analogous to the well-known 
tulip mania, and other fantasies of a like kind. In 
1753, at the sale of Commodore Lisle’s shells at 
Longford’s, four Wentletraps were sold for seventy- 
five pounds twelve shillings: viz. one not quite 
perfect, for sixteen guineas; avery fine and perfect 
one for eighteen guineas; one for sixteen guineas ; 
and one for twenty-three pounds two shillings.* 
But higher prices than these have been given. 
That in Mr. Bullock’s museum, supposed to be the 
largest known, brought at his sale the sum of 271., 
and was estimated in 1815 at double that value; 
and there is a tradition that a specimen was sold 
in France for 2,400 livres, or 100 louis! 
Another section, known as false Wentletraps, 
have the whorls contiguous; and many of these 
species are European. Some of them secrete a 
COMMON WENTLETRAP. 
purple liquor, as has already been noticed in these 
pages respecting our commonest native species, S. 
communis. This shell is turreted, usually about 
* Da Costa’s Elements, 204. 
