38 CONCHOLOGIST’S COMPANION. 
curious is one with a bust of Sabastian, king of Por- 
tugal, and a shell-fish floating on the ocean. 
But my business is at present simply to point out 
the admirable fitness of these feeble creatures to their 
respective spheres of action. They journey occa- 
sionally to a considerable distance from their native 
element, and are frequently deserted by the tide. 
How, then, is it possible that they can return? That 
Being who denies to this gradation of his works those 
facilities for locomotion which he assigns to almost 
every other, has not left them without a substitute : 
they immediately expand their valves as wide as 
possible, and then close them with a sudden jerk; 
an impulse is thus given, which enables them to move 
to the distance of four or five inches, and by a con- 
tinual repetition of this simple operation, Scallops 
gradually tumble forward till they regain the water. 
Nor is this all. They are sometimes exposed to the 
rude tossing of the waves, and their fragile barks are 
consequently liable to be broken against the rocks ; 
but, to obviate the possibility of such an incon- 
venience, they are endowed with the faculty of 
spinning threads, by méans of which they can sud- 
denly lay hold of stones or pieces of timber, and 
hence they are often found securely fixed to some 
projecting rock, on which they have been hurried, 
like shipwrecked mariners, by the fury of a tempest. 
