PECTINID^. — SCALLOP. 117 



very quaint and beautiful shapes, and, occasionally, they 

 have reference to the object or history of the building ; 

 for instance, any building in any way connected with 

 Santiago has the nails in the form of scallop shells.* 

 The custom of bearing scallop shells as a badge of 

 pilgrimage, is more widely spread than is usually sup- 

 posed, for Sir Rutherford Alcock mentions their use on 

 the sleeves of many of the Japanese pilgrims to the 

 Cone of Fusiyama, in the island of Japan. In China, 

 the valves of Pecten Japonicus are used as small shovels. 

 Shells were used by the Romans to ornament their 

 dwellings, and the " Fountain of Shells/' described in 

 Sir William Gell's ' Pompeiana/ was decorated with 

 the Tyrian murex and the scallop. Mr. Damon tells us 

 that there is still standing, in a villa at Pompeii, a 

 fountain decorated with the shells of the Mediterranean, 

 one species of which, viz., Murex Brandaris, retains 

 its colour and general freshness, and is not to be dis- 

 tinguished from living examples. In an interesting 

 paper on a ' Collection of recent shells discovered among 

 the ruins of Pompeii, and preserved in the Museo 

 Borbonico at Naples/ published in the l Geological 

 Magazine/ vol iv. No. 7, July, 1867, Mr. Damon calls 

 our attention to the following, and says, that " Among 

 the many singular discoveries made in the ruins of 

 Pompeii, and deposited in the Museo Borbonico, in the 

 city of Naples, are a variety of shells, principally species 

 now found in the Mediterranean Sea, amongst them 

 Pecten Jacobceus, and so far of interest as an illustration 

 of the persistency of certain known species within the 

 historic period, no difference whatever being observable 

 between the disinterred, and living specimens. On a 

 * • A Summer in Spain,' by Mrs. Ramsey, p. 102. 



