NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 



LET TEE III. 



TO THE SAME. 



THE fossil-shells of this district, and sorts of stone, such as have fallen 

 within my observation, must not be passed over in silence. And first 

 I must mention, as a great curiosity, a specimen that was ploughed up 

 in the chalky fields, near the side of the Down, and given to me for the 

 singularity of its appearance, which, to an incurious eye, seems like a 

 petrified fish of about four inches long, the cardo passing for an head 

 and mouth. It is in reality a bivalve of the Linnaean Genus of Mytilus 



OSTREA CARINATA. 



and the species of Crista Galli; called by Lister, Rastellum ; by 

 Rumphius, Ostreum plicatum minus ; by D'Argenville, Auris Porci, 

 s. Crista Galli; and by those who make collections, Cock's Comb. 

 Though I applied to several such in London, I never could meet with 

 an entire specimen ; nor could I ever find in books any engraving from 

 a perfect one. In the superb museum at Leicester House permission 

 was given me to examine for this article ; and, though I was disap- 

 pointed as to the fossil, I was highly gratified with the sight of several 

 of the shells themselves in high preservation. This bivalve is only 

 known to inhabit the Indian ocean, where it fixes itself to a zoophyte, 

 known by the name Gorgonia. The curious foldings of the suture the 

 one into the other, the alternate flutinge or grooves, and the curved 

 form of my specimen being much easier expressed by the pencil than 

 by words, I have caused it to be drawn and engraved.* 



* Our author was mistaken in referring this fossil to the Mytilus crista galli 

 of Linnaeus. Mr. Bennet, who has explained the subject in a note to his edition 



