X INTRODUCTION. 



"The lute was first devised 

 In imitation of a tortoise' back, 

 AMiose sinews parched by Apollo's beams, 

 Echoed about the concave of the shell; 

 And sceinpr the shortest and smallest s'are shrillest sound; 

 They found out frets, whose sweet diversity 

 Well touched by the skilful learned finders, 

 Roused so strange a multitude of chords. 

 And the opinion many do confirm, 

 Because tesiudo siprniiies a lute." 



Aud novr we are amon^ the myths and fables of antiquity, we 

 may just mention another application of the shell to musical 

 ])urpo.sos. I^eptune, who, accorclin(]f to the Grecian mytholocfy, 

 was the o;od of the sea, is frequently represented as goincj forth 

 in his car in great state and pomp, with a body-guard of Tritons; 

 some of whom go before with twisted conch shells as trumpets, 

 with which we are to suppose they make delightful harmony. Venus, 

 too, the goddess of beauty, rode on the ocean foam in a testaceous 

 car. Thus Dryden says, thnt Albion — our native land, so called 

 on account of its chalky clifls, from the Latin alha — white: — 



"Was to Neptune recommended; 

 ^Peace and plenty spread the sails; 



yenus in her shell before him, 



From the sands in safety bore him." 



But witliout believing all these fables, more poetical than true. 

 NNc may soon convince ourselves that in the hollow chambers of 

 a shell, there does seem to dwell, like an imprisoned spirit, a 

 low sad kind of music. An English poet, named "Walter Savage 

 Lauder, has well described this in these lines — 



"Of pearly hue 

 \yithin, and they that lustre have imbibed 

 In the sun's palace porch, where, when unyoked, 

 His chariot wheel stands midway in the wave; 

 Shake one, and it awakens; then apply 

 Its pftlished lips to your attentive ear, 

 And it remembers its aufju^t abodes, 

 Aud murmui-s as the ocean murmurs there," 



Wordswortli, too, gives a beautifid description of a child ai)plyiiig 

 one of these pearly musical-boxes to his ear. 



Many other uses of shells might be mentioned, to show that 

 they perform an important part in the operations of nature, as 

 the means and modes by and in which God sees fit to order the 

 affairs of this world are frequently called; and also promote the 

 ends of science, and the arts of eveiy-day life. By the decom- 

 positioji of the shells, of which they are partly composed, solid 

 rocks frequently crumble to pieces, and spreading over a considerable 



