192 



ADDITIONS TO "BRITISH CONCHOLOGY." 



By J. T. MARSHALL. 



Part VII. (continued from page igo). 



C. bcifkei was originally dredged in Plymouth Sound by Mr. 

 George Barlee, to whoni it was dedicated by Gwyn Jeffreys, although 

 Mr. Barlee liad some difificulty at the time in persuading Searles Wood 

 and Gwyn Jeffreys to recognise his species. At the time of his dis- 

 covery, Mr. Barlee was systematically working out the Devon and 

 Cornwall coasts with all the zeal of an enthusiast, hut when he reached 

 the Land's End he was persuaded to transfer his energies to the Hebrides 

 and Shetlands, so that he stopped short of the Scilly Islands. Had 

 he gone on to the latter district, I have no doubt he would have done 

 justice to what I consider to be the most promising dredging field in 

 the British Islands, and one which is full of possibilities. It is almost 

 untouched ground, and will well repay the practical dredger. It is 

 true Lord Vernon did some dredging from his yacht in Scilly waters 

 one summer in the sixties, but he was disappointed in not obtaining 

 what he wanted, "large shells," while the fine "rubbish " he threw 

 away. 



Mr. Barlee's conversion to conchology, at the mature age of forty- 

 five, may be worth recording. It arose out of a visit to Paignton 

 during a period of his life in which he had sustained a deeply-felt loss 

 in an only child, a young boy, which seriously affected his health, and 

 Paignton was one of the many places he visited in his search for 

 forgetfulness. Walking on the beach one day, he noticed two ladies 

 in front of him continually bobbing up and down picking up some- 

 thing, and on reaching them learnt that it was a lady and her daughter 

 engaged in the congenial occupation of picking up shells, with which 

 the beach was then plentifully strewn after a storm. He courteously 

 assisted them, and was subsequently invited to pay them a visit, when 

 he was shown their collections, became interested in learning the 

 names of their shells, and finally took to collecting them for himself, 

 until it aroused in him a zeal and enthusiasm such as he had never 

 before experienced. Thereafter he was never so happy as when he 

 was out collecting or dredging, which he pursued with the greatest 

 avidity, only interrupted by repeated attacks of illness, which laid 

 him prostrate in his cabin for a week at a time, and then going at it 

 again night and day until another period of prostration came upon 

 him ; and although he never got over the loss of his boy, he found in 

 conchology a never-failing solace. His line collection, in the Oxford 



