154 EDIBLE BRITISH MOLLUSKS. 



colour; and another live specimen I received afterwards 

 was not so bright. 



Mactra subtruncata, or the lady-cockle, as it is called 

 at Belfast, is said by Mr. Alder to be gathered at Lam- 

 lash Bay, and used as food for pigs, and in some parts it 

 is used as bait by fishermen. 



One other species of Mactra may be mentioned as 

 edible, as it is eaten in the Channel Islands, and also in 

 Spain, viz. Lutraria elliptica, very unlike the Mactridse in 

 appearance, and not tempting to look at. It is a broad 

 flattish shell, about five inches long, and three in height, 

 with a long tube, something resembling My a arenaria. 

 It lives in muddy estuaries, and at the mouths of 

 rivers, buried to the depth of one and a half to two feet ; 

 and I have had some fine specimens from the mouth of 

 the Towy, in Carmarthenshire. 



Mr. Dennis* says the Lutraria are called clumps at 

 Herm, and I am told by Mr. Morton, that the fishermen 

 in Jersey know them by the name of horse-shoes. In 

 cooking them, they are first boiled, then taken out of 

 their shells and fried. Lutraria oblouga, which is a com- 

 mon species in some of the little muddy estuaries near 

 Croisic and Piriac, on the coast of the Loire Inferieure, 

 is said by M. Cailliaud to be very generally eaten, but 

 it is a rare species with us, though it has been taken on 

 the Devon, Cornwall, and Dorset coasts. Mactrse are 

 also found in great quantities buried in the sandbanks 

 on the coast of Chili. 



" To Dress Mactridae. — Boil them, and then eat them 

 with pepper, salt, and vinegar." 



* ' British Conchology,' vol. ii. p. 430. 



