color spreading in different directions 

 from a common center. At Newport, 

 Rhode Island, the writer has gathered 

 many thousand specimens of a beautiful 

 little Tellen (Tellina tenera), whose shell 

 measures scarcely half an inch in diame- 

 ter and is tinted a lovely pink or pinkish 

 white. The siphons of this family are 

 very long and are separated, the upper 

 one being half or three-quarters as long 

 as the lower one, and the foot is rather 

 long and pointed, admirably adapted for 

 burrowing. The long siphons enable the 

 animal to bury itself to quite a depth be- 

 neath the surface of the sand. 



Closely related to the Tellinidae is the 

 Psammobiidae, a characteristic form of 

 which (Psammobia rubroradiata) is thus 

 spoken of by Prof. Josiah Keep, in his in- 

 teresting little book, "West Coast Shells:" 

 "But I wanted to see more of him, so I 

 took a large jar, rilled it half full of beach 

 sand, added as much sea-water as it 

 would hold, and plunged my prize into 

 the same. He rested quietly for a few 

 minutes, and then began to open his shell 

 and cautiously put out his two siphons. 

 Soon afterward, from between the edges 

 of his shells, came his big, white, spade- 

 shaped foot. He drove it down into the 

 sand, curved it a little to one side, gave 

 a vigorous pull, and lo ! his shell followed, 

 though just why I could not clearly under- 

 stand. Though the jar was large he 

 reached the bottom before his shell was 

 wholly covered with sand, and had to 

 content himself with a half-above-ground 

 tenement." 



"Next morning his siphons were 

 stretched out some six inches in length. 

 * * * I never thought before that 

 there was any particular beauty to the 

 siphons of a clam, but for this red-lined 

 one my opinions quickly changed. Im- 

 agine two tubes made of the finest pink 

 and white silk, stretched over delicate 

 hoops arranged at regular intervals ; then 

 think of them as endowed with life, and 

 waving with a graceful motion through 

 the water, and you will have a faint idea 

 of their exquisite texture and elegant ap- 

 pearance." 



To those readers who live in the West, 

 away from the ocean, the Unio, or fresh- 

 water mussel, is more or less familiar. 

 What child in Chicago has not played on 



the sands of Lake Michigan and scooped 

 up the little grains with the broken half 

 of a clam shell? Or who, wading in the 

 muddy water of Lake Calumet, has not 

 wondered what the curious little hollow, 

 fringed objects were which protruded 

 from the surface of the mud ? These lat- 

 ter were the siphons of the clam and if 

 yoa were to dig under them a little way 

 you would find the beautiful green-rayed 

 shell of a river mussel. These are no less 

 interesting than the marine shells already 

 described and in beauty of ornamentation 

 they frequently excel many of their salt- 

 water relatives. Such excrescences as 

 knobs, spines and rib-like undulations are 

 common, while the colors of the interior 

 range from pure silvery white through 

 orange, pink and salmon to dark purple, 

 and the rich, pearly iridescence rivals that 

 of any of the marine shells. In many 

 parts of the West mussels are collected by 

 men in search of pearls, which are gen- 

 erally of an inferior quality, and thou- 

 sands of shells are used annually in the 

 manufacture of pearl buttons. 



One of the most familiar objects to the 

 seaside visitor is the huge banks of sea- 

 mussels (Mytilus) which line the shore 

 at low water. The shells are generally 

 dark-colored, our common mussel (Myti- 

 lus edulis) being frequently jet black, and 

 are more or less wedge-shaped in form. 

 They attach themselves to mud banks and 

 shore vegetation by a strong byssus made 

 up of stout, more or less silky threads. 

 The mussels are of great value econom- 

 ically, thousands of bushels of the edible 

 mussel (Mytilus edulis) being consumed 

 annually in Europe. They are also used 

 as bait, and millions of the mussels are 

 thus used every year. Although consid- 

 ered a delicacy in parts of Great Britain 

 and Europe, it has not yet been adopted 

 as an article of diet in this country, the 

 clam and quahaug taking its place. 



The family Aviculidae, comprising the 

 wing-shells or pearl oysters, is of great 

 interest, both scientifically and economic- 

 ally. At the present time there are a lit- 

 tle over one hundred species living, but 

 the family has been known from early 

 geological times and over a thousand 

 species have been found in the rocks. 

 The pearl-oyster (Melleagrina margariti- 

 fera) is the most important member of 



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