THE BEIDGE AT BIDEFORD. 179 



sight nothing appears more easy than to pluck out 

 this organ by the roots, but an attempt will prove 

 the experiment to be more difficult than many per- 

 sons suppose. 



The colour of the foot varies considerably in dif- 

 ferent specimens, even of the same species. Some, for 

 instance, are of a chesnut brown ; others of a kind 

 of mauve or purple, covered with a peach-like bloom 

 during life ; others, again, are of a deep-toned umber, 

 while not a few are pearly white, and streaked some- 

 times with pink like a tulip. 



The peculiarity of the Mussel to attach itself to 

 foreign substances has been taken advantage of for 

 the benefit of man, and a curious instance is exhibited 

 at Bideford in Devonshire, at which town there is a 

 bridge of twenty-four arches, stretching across the 

 Torridge river near its junction with the Taw. ' At 

 this bridge the tide flows so rapidly that it cannot be 

 kept in repair by mortar. The corporation, therefore, 

 keep boats in employ to bring mussels to it, and the 

 interstices of the bridge are filled by hand with these 

 mussels. It is supported from being driven away 

 entirely by the strong threads these mussels fix to 

 the. stonework/ 



Like most other writers who quote this strange 

 account, I have not had ocular proof of its accuracy. 1 

 That it is quite probable I can readily believe, as a 



1 Since writing the above, I have received the following interesting epistle from 

 Mr. Edward Capern, the celebrated 'poet and rural postman' of Bideford, who kindly 



