CHAPTER VHI 



THE SMALLER SEA-SHELLS 



When the tide is high the waves often wash up 

 a great number of little shells into sheltered coves, 

 and leave them there to be gathered when the water 

 has ebbed away. It is very pleasant to lie down 

 upon the warm sand on a summer afternoon, and 

 while the waves are making gentle music at your 

 feet to look for these beautiful bits of organic struc- 

 ture. Whenever you hnd a pretty one you put it 

 away in a little bag, or what is more likely, you lay 

 it in the bowl of some large shell that you have 

 picked up for that purpose. 



Among the most abundant of the shells 

 to be thus found on our coast is the little 

 Common Dove-shell, Columhella gausa- 

 pata^ Gould, shown somewhat magnified 

 in Figure 149. The shell is really about Fig. 149, x? 

 the size of a grain ot wheat. The spire is 

 conical, the lip thickened, and in the variety carinata^ 

 Hinds, there is a distinct keel just below the suture. 

 The coloring of the shell is chestnut brown and its 

 surface is polished and glistening, and it is often 

 mottled with dots and stripes. This little moUusk 

 lives in great numbers at the roots of the eel-grass, 

 and dead shells are washed up abundantly upon the 

 shore. It may also be found alive when the tide 

 is low. 



