THE TWISTED TRITON. 



315 



The Royal Murex {Murex regius) is a very tine? example of this genus, and is valued, 

 not only for its rarity, but for the extreme beauty of its form and coloring, which render it an 

 ornament to any cabinet. In color it resembles the thorny woodcock. 



The large empty shell lying in the centre of the engraving represents the Sea Trumpet, 

 or Conch-shell, so familiar from the use to which it has been put for ages, and which has 

 rendered it a classical appendage to the marine deity whose name it bears. 



The Sea Trumpet sometimes attains to a large size, a foot or more in length ; and, when 

 it has attained its full dimensions, is employed among the South Sea Islanders and Australians 

 as a trumpet. In order to fit the shell for this purpose, a round hole is bored in the side, 

 at about one-fourth the length from the tip, and the required sound is elicited by laying the 

 shell to the lips, and blowing across the hole as a performer blows the flute. The note — if 



the noise produced can be called by that name — i ■ 



ow and disagreeable ; but as it is loud 



TWISTED TRITON.— Triton dUtortm. SEA TRUMPET.- Triton variegates. WRINKLED TRITON.— Triton, anu 



and unlike any other sound, it answers the purpose of those who employ it. "While blowing 

 the conch, the performer introduces his right hand into the cavity, much in the manner of a 

 player upon the French horn. 



Below the Sea Trumpet lies another shell, which w T ould hardly be taken for a Triton until 

 turned over, so as to show the whole of the contour. This is the Wrinkled, or Old Woman 

 Tritox, so called because the corrugated and rudely oval mouth, with its white crumpled 

 folds, is thought to bear some distant resemblance to the face of an old woman surrounded 

 with a close cap. The Wrinkled Triton is comparatively a small species, as may be seen from 

 the proportions preserved in the figure. 



Behind the larger figure is seen the Twisted Triton, represented in the act of crawling, 

 and given, not so much to exhibit any peculiarity of its shell, which is hidden behind that of 

 the larger species, as to show the form of the animal, its large foot, and eyes placed at the 

 bases of the tentacles, The operculum of this animal is small and leaf-shaped, the nucleus 

 being at one end. 



