MURICID^. — WHELK. 193 



Whelks are sold at Is. 6d. to 2s. a measure ; and are 

 in season from August to September, though they are 

 really good to eat at any time. Children are frequently 

 seen buying a saucer of whelks in London in the spring ; 

 and the shellfish shops near Billingsgate market are 

 well stocked with them. There are, as Woodward 

 remarks, two different shellfish sold in London under 

 the name of Whelks or Buckies, namely, the common 

 Buccinum undatum, and the more prized Fusus antiquos. 

 Whelks are very troublesome to the lobster-fishers, 

 for they often devour the bait, and I have seen at 

 St. Margaret's-at-Cliffe, on the Kentish coast, the 

 lobster-pots drawn up, one after the other, baitless, 

 and full of these greedy mollusks ; most trying to the 

 poor fishermen, especially when bait was scarce, and 

 they had been obliged to walk some miles in the 

 morning to purchase it. 



On some parts of the coast the fishermen use *the 

 Buccinum for bait for the long-line fishing, and Mr. 

 Smethurst, of Grimsby, says that when the fishermen 

 get on to what is called the " shawl " of the Dogger 

 Bank, in the spring, when the fish (such as cod, ling, 

 halibut, skate and haddock), begin to accumulate in 

 the warm weather, whelks are used as bait, and that 

 when they fished at the north end of the Dogger, at 

 the fall of the year, and in deeper water, lampreys 

 were used along with whelks* 



The Lamprey (Petromyzon fluviatilis) is considered 

 very valuable as bait, and in the winter and spring 

 numbers are found in the river Trent, at Sawley, in 

 Leicestershire, and are collected in baskets from the 

 weirs to which they adhere, and sent off alive in 

 * « Mollusks, Mussels, Whelks,' &c., by Charles Harding. 



O 



