Manchester Memoirs, Vol. Ix. (191 6), No. 8. 3 



Pliny tells us that a deputation of persons from 

 Olisipo [Lisbon], that had been sent for the purpose, 

 brought word to the Emperor Tiberius that a triton had 

 been both seen and heard in a certain cavern, blowing a 

 conch-shell, and of the form under which they are usually 

 represented. 5 And one of the Scholiasts on Homer says, 

 that before the discovery of the brazen trumpet by the 

 Tyrrhenians, the conch-shell was in general use for that 

 purpose. 6 



The larger species of Buccinum is still used by 

 Italian herdsmen in directing their cattle. It is also 

 common in North Wales, Staffordshire, Lithuania, and 

 Muscovy, where they are also applied to pastoral pur- 

 poses. 7 At Casamicciola, in the Island of Ischia, conch 

 shell trumpets are sounded to scare away thieves and 

 birds from the vineyards and gardens. 8 Sicilian fishermen 

 use Triton nodiferus as a trumpet, and Verany tells us 

 that at Nice this shell, with a hole at the top, serves as a 

 trumpet for the fishermen and country people, and that 

 the braying noise produced by it renders this unmusical 

 instrument indispensible for the old-fashioned charivari, 

 whidi he describes as a deafening serenade to signalize 

 the marriages of widows and ill-assorted couples. 9 A. 

 Mosso relates that the Triton is still sounded in church 

 at Piedmont, and that during the services in Holy Week 

 at Chieri, when the choir was singing the psalms, and a 

 table was struck with sticks during the so-called tenebrae 

 of the sepulchre, the sacristan gave him a Triton shell to 



5 Pliny, "Nat. Hist.,' ; ix., ch. 4. (Bohn's Ed., vol. ii., p. 362). 



6 Ibid, (footnote by Bostock & Riley). 



7 Roberts, op. at., p. 97, and Lovell, "Edible Brit. Moll,'' 1884, p. 

 194. 



8 Lovell, op. cit., p. 194, quoting Dr. Wm. Russell, "Memories of 

 Ischia," Nineteenth Century, Sept., 1883. 



9 Jeffreys, op. n't., iv„ 1867, p. 303. 



