NATUllAL HISTOEY OF SELBOllNE 
7 
LET TEE IIL 
TO THE SAME. 
The fossil-shells of this district, and sorts of stone, such as have fallen 
within my observation, must not be passed over in silence. And first 
I must mention, as a great curiosity, a specimen that was ploughed up 
in the chalky fields, near the side of the Down, and given to me for the 
singularity of its appearance, which, to an incurious eye, seems like a 
petrified fish of about four inches long, the cardo passing for an head 
and mouth. It is in reality a bivalve of the Linnaean Genus of Mytilus 
OSTREA CARINATA. 
and the species of Crista Galli ; called by Lister, Rastellum ; by 
Kumphius, Ostrewn plicatum minus ; by D'Argenville, Auris Porci, 
s. Crista Galli; and by those who make collections. Cock's Comb. 
Though I applied to several such in London, I never could meet with 
an entire specimen ; nor could I ever find in books any engraving from 
a perfect one. In the superb museum at Leicester House permission 
was given me to examine for this article ; and, though I was disap- 
pointed as to the fossil, I was highly gratified with the sight of several 
of the shells themselves in high preservation. This bivalve is only 
known to inhabit the Indian ocean, where it fixes itself to a zoophyte, 
known by the name Gorgonia. The curious foldings of the suture the 
one into the other, the alternate flutings or grooves, and the curved 
form of my specimen being much easier expressed by the pencil than 
by words, I have caused it to be drawn and engraved.* 
^ Our author was mistaken in referring this fossil to the Mytilus crista galli 
of Linnseus. Mr. Bennet, who has explained the subject in a note to his edition 
