128 



EDIBLE BRITISH MOLLUSKS. 



£5. The Chinese also hold reversed chank-shells in 

 special veneration, and give high prices for them. They 

 are kept in the Pagodas by the priests and used on 

 special occasions, and the consecrated oil is kept in one 

 of these sinistrorsal Turbinellidce, with which the Em- 

 peror is anointed at his coronation.* From the earliest 

 ages, the Gulf of Manaar has been fished for chanks. 



Dr. Potter, in his ' Archaeologia Grseca,' vol. ii., states 

 that' the ancient Greeks used shells as trumpets, as the 

 Spaniards do at the present day; and that the first Gre- 

 cian signals were lighted torches thrown from both 

 armies by men who were priests of Mars, and that these 

 signals being laid aside, shells of fishes succeeded, which 

 were sounded in the manner of trumpets, which in those 

 days were not invented. Hence Theognis's riddle may 

 easily be interpreted : — 



*' A sea-inhaMtant with living mouth 

 Spoke to me to go home, though dead it was." 



Triton's shell-trumpet is famous in poetical story, 

 whence Ovid, speaking of Neptune : — 



" Alreadj' Triton at his call appears 

 Above the waves, a Tynan robe he wears ; 

 And in his hand a crooked trumpet bears. 

 The sov'reign bids hira peaceful sounds inspire, 

 And give the waves the signal to retire ; 

 His writhen shell he takes, whose narrow vent 

 Grows by degrees into a large extent." — Bryden. 



And most of the poets mention this custom in their 

 description of primitive wars. 



The German name for the whelk is very appropriate, 

 viz. Trow,petenschnecke, or Kinkhorn. In Anglo-Saxon 

 whelk is weolc, but weolc is said to mean that which 



* Lubbock's 'Prehistoric Times,' vol. i. p. 222. 



