PREFACE. IX 



metropolis, that the following little treatise 

 has been put together. The scientific 

 reader will find in it very little of novelty, 

 and not any of a theme, which fills too 

 many pages of some conchologists, the 

 invention of new systems, and the de- 

 molition of old ones; the contempt of for- 

 mer, and the abuse of cotemporary writers. 

 It aspires, indeed, to the approbation of the 

 well- instructed, as a useful manual, and as 

 a correct epitome of the science of Testa- 

 ceology in its present state. To more than 

 this it does not pretend. 



To the great naturalist Linnaeus, whose 

 comprehensive mind seems, in many in- 

 stances, to have anticipated the objections 

 which envy or ignorance would raise 

 against his system, and his fame, we are 



