HELICID.E. SNAIL. 223 



unexpected appearance that they gave up the castle to 

 the besiegers. 



The Romans were very partial to snails as an article 

 of food, and fed them till they grew to a large size. 

 Several sorts are mentioned by Pliny, and they were 

 all kept separate; amongst others, white ones that 

 were found in the neighbourhood of Rieti. He 

 describes the Illyrian snails as the largest (probably 

 Helix lucorum, or Helix cincta), the African as the most 

 prolific ; others from Soletum, in the Neapolitan terri- 

 tory, as the noblest and best. He also speaks of some 

 as attaining to so enormous a size that their shells 

 would contain eighty pieces of money of the common 

 currency,* that is to say, eighty quadrantes, the 

 quadrans being a small copper coin three-quarters of 

 an inch in diameter, about the size of a new sixpence, 

 and one-sixteenth of an inch thick. This statement of 

 Pliny's is really not so improbable as may appear at 

 first sight, for on trying how many sixpences a usual- 

 sized specimen of our largest snail, Helix pomatia, 

 would hold, I find that about forty could easily be put 

 into it ; and very fine specimens are to be found in the 

 neighbourhood of the Mont Grenier, in Savoy, which 

 would certainly hold more than forty. In the museum 

 of the Jardin des Plantes, in Paris, there are two 

 specimens of this Helix from Moldavia, nearly twice 

 the size of the usual ones, measuring about two and a 

 quarter inches in breadth, and which would easily hold 

 eighty sixpences. 



Fulvius Hirpinus studied the art of fattening them 

 with so much success, that some of his snails would 



* Kirby's ' History of Animals,' &c., Bridgewater Treatise,' vol. i. 

 p. 281. 



