N 



PLATE XI. 



Buccinum canaliculatum minus, crassum varicolor, striatum, seu 

 Purpura Anglicana. Purpuro-buccinum. Da 

 Costa Br. Conch, tab. 7 fig. 1. 2. 3. 4. 9. 12. 



This is a strong, thick shell, generally about one inch and a half in 

 length, of a full pyramidal shape, with a point acute ; it has five 

 spires, furrowed : the ridges of the lower wreath notched, or scaled, 

 and very rough. Within the mouth it has five long parallel teeth. 



The colours are various, often of a simple and uniform yellowish 

 brown, sandy, or clay colour; sometimes quite white, or white 

 tinged with violet, and fasciated with yellow or brown ; the latter are 

 the most elegant varieties of B. Lapillus.-— These shells are found in 

 great abundance near low watermark, on many of the shores of 

 Great-Britain. It is one of the species that yields the purple dye ana- 

 logous to the purpura of the ancients; and though the value of its 

 dye has been long superseded by the cochineal insect, the shells that 

 produced it are objects of curiosity. The Tyrian purple was the most 

 admired, and is known to have been extracted from a species of the 

 Murex\ but other purples of inferior lustre are also mentioned by 

 the ancients. Da Costa imagines that the liquor of this Whelke 

 (Buccinum Lapillus) was a valuable purple to the ancient English, 

 and quotes the authority of Bede, who lived about the seventh cen- 

 tury, for this opinion. " There are," says Bede, " snails in very 

 great abundance, from which a scarlet or crimson dye is made, whose 

 elegant redness never fades, either by the heat of the sun, or the in- 

 juries of rain, but the older it is, the more elegant*.** 



* Sunt cochleae, satis superqueabundantes, quibus tinctura coccinei colons conficltur, 

 Cujus rubor pulcherrimus nullo unquam soils ardore, nulla valet pluviarum injuria pal- 

 lescere j sed quo vetustior, eo sclet esse venustior.— Bede, Hist. Eccles. (edit, opt.) 1. i. c. U 

 P *77* 



