PLOT 229 



others are true fossils such as a " Strombites," which is 

 compared to the living "Concha Tridacna," so called, 

 the author quaintly observes, "because they made three 

 Mouthfuls apiece," and he ingenuously adds that were 

 "the Strombites not a Stone I must pronounce it the 

 Same," i.e., as the living Tridacna. A " Conchites " of 

 the kind we now term " Ehynchonella" is introduced to 

 us, and in a digression we are informed that specimens 

 of this "made red-hot and put into drink are accounted 

 a present Remedy for a Stitch." 



There is also a Pecten, which the author compares 

 with the Pecten asper of Aldrovandus, and an Oyster 

 (evidently Ostrea dilatatd), of which it is remarked, " I 

 could easily have assented that these . . . might once 

 indeed have been Shell-fish, but that (just as with the 

 Escallops) we only find the protuberant parts of the Shells 

 [convex valves] and never any of the flat ones." We 

 then come to a fossil, now known as Cidaris, which is 

 spoken of as "a curiously embroidered Stone, much 

 resembling the petrified Eiccio Marino, or Sea-Urchin of 

 Imperatus" also known to old authors as Mamelles de 

 Saint Paul and as Ova Anguina, " because from the 

 Basis there issue as it were five Tails of Serpents, waved 

 and attenuated towards the Upper part of the Stones." 

 These " Old Authors" regarded it as "engendered from 

 the Salivation and Slime of Snakes, and cast into the Air 

 by the Force of their Sibilations : where if taken, has 

 Effects as wonderful as its Generation, and therefore of 

 great Esteem amongst the French Druids" "But," 

 concludes our excellent author, "I care not to spend my 

 time in Romance and therefore proceed," and so passes to 

 the Cornua Ammonis, or Ophiomorphites, our Ammonites. 

 Some of these are found " about Adderbury, about two 

 Miles from Banbury, but . . . that the Town has not 

 its Name from these Stones (as Mr. Eay thinks) I dare 



