CONCHOLOGY. 



Occasionally it is seen, though rarely, crawhng on the sands at 

 low water. 



In a natural classification of the shell tribe, should we ever 

 arrive at an arrangement of Conchology, so perfect as to deserve that 

 epithet, it would be a task of some difficulty to fix the precise station 

 of the Wentletrap ; for in the order of nature it presents anomalies 

 which cannot easily be reconciled, and few authors are agreed upon 

 this subject even in the artificial arrangements which they have been 

 induced to adopt. Thus Rumpfius makes it a Buccinum, Davila 

 a Tuyau^ Argenville places it as a Terehra (vis) and De Montfort 

 Scalarus. In the Encyclopaedia it is denominated Scalaria Pretiosa, 

 and this name Lamarck retains. 



The name of Wentltrap, by which this shell is now so well 

 known, is derived from the Dutch Language, and signifies according 

 to the technical phraseology of the Dutch architects in building, a 

 winding stair case, or flight of stairs turning spirally round a central 

 column, into which one end of every step is mortised as they ascend 

 from the base upwards. The term Wentletrap, Wenteltrap, or 

 as the Dutch sometimes call it, Wendeltrap,* is the name given by 

 Rumpfius the Hollander to this shell, as a synonymous name with his 

 latin term Scalare, It is an allusion, somewhat fanciful we must allow, 

 to the disposition of the costal ridges upon this shell, and which when 

 viewed laterally as they traverse or pass over the upper convexity of 

 the whorls on each side, have the appearance of a flight of steps turning 

 spirally round the body of the shell, just as a winding staircase would 



* Wenteltrap, Wendeltrapy Rondom gaande trap, met canspil daar al de 

 trappen in schroeveii. Marin. 



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