288 MOLLUSCA OF SALT AND FRESH WATER. 



cockles, full grown and all alive, in the well-springs of a 

 moor ! At the meeting of the Wernerian Society on the 19th 

 of November, 1825, Henry Witham, Esq., read, what is 

 called by the reporter, " a very interesting paper," on the 

 discovery of Live Cockles in CocMesbury moss, in Yorkshire, 

 distant about forty miles from the sea-coast. The Cockles 

 were collected in considerable quantity : and Mr. Witham 

 had the curiosity to eat some of them, which differed " but 

 little in taste from the common cockle, unless it were that 

 they seemed not quite so salt." The specimens exhibited 

 left no doubt that the cockles in question were identical with 

 the Cardium edule.* No story-teller could desire a more 

 loveable disposition in his auditors than that of the philoso- 

 phers who listened with interest to such a communication ; 

 but, unfortunately, naturalists are not less the subjects of a 

 practical joke than your learned antiquaries. I need scarcely 

 say that some wicked wag had carried the cockles to Cock- 

 lesbury-moss to hoax the worthy, benevolent, and zealous 

 communicant. 



fish, which we commonly call cockles. The part of the shore to which 

 these are carried, the inhabitants call the great sands, because there, upon 

 the ebbing of the tide, a sand-bank, upwards of a mile in length, is left 

 bare, out of which large shells are dug, believed, in the neighbourhood, to be 

 produced from that seed which the river brings down from the fountain, 

 or at least, to have grown larger in the sea." 

 * Ann. of Philosophy, n. s. xi. 465-7. 



