SHELLS AND THEIR INHABITANTS. 127 
The blackbirds are in much fear of jackdaws, our invalid 
crouches as though at the approach of a sparrow-hawk, when 
one flies to take his food from him. Mr. F. S. Ellis, who is 
better known as an authority on rare books and MSS. than as 
a lover of birds, told us that he had discovered a jackdaw in 
the act of dragging the young out of a blackbird’s nest, with a 
view doubtless of tearing them limb from limb, and thus pro- 
viding food suitable for his young. 
Why cannot some of these ferocious birds turn their attention 
to sparrows ? of them we have far more than enough. The 
same informant told me of a strange scene lately enacted at a 
neighbour’s house. Such was the uproar amongst the jackdaws 
that they went to see what was happening in the bird-world, 
and found that a jackdaw with only one claw had been con- 
demned to death by his comrades. The decree had gone forth 
and they fell upon him, pecking and beating him to the death. 
May such not be the fate of our poor invalid ! 
Chagford. Helen J. Ormerod. 
SHELLS AND THEIR INHABITANTS.^ 
RUE lovers of nature, amongst whom of course we do 
not include the mere collector of natural history objects, 
but those real Selbornians who, if they collect at all, 
do so as an aid to their studies and therefore intelli- 
gently, will welcome this forerunner of “ The Cambridge Natural 
History.” 
The series is intended, we are informed, “ in the first instance 
for those who have not had any special scientific training, and 
who are not necessarily acquainted with scientific language.” 
To begin with, therefore, we are told in the opening pages some- 
thing about mollusca generally and the great groups into which 
they are divided. The origin of these principal groups is, as 
Mr. Cooke indicates, a problem of very great subtlety, but he 
finds less difficulty in tracing, as he next proceeds to do, the 
origin of the land and freshwater forms from certain marine ones, 
taking for granted of course the axiom of most naturalists that 
the good old sea has been the cradle of all life. The conversion 
from a marine to a terrestrial mode of life was of course a gradual 
one, brought about by some forms accustoming themselves to 
live first in brackish and then in fresh water or to exist for longer 
and longer periods out of their native element altogether. 
* Molluscs, by the Rev. A. H. Cooke, M.A. Brachiopods (Recent), by A. E. 
.Shipley. Brachiopods (Fossil), by F. R. C. Reed, M.A., pp. xi., 535; 3 maps, 
334 text illustrations. The Cambridge Natural History, vol. iii. (London : Mac- 
millan & Co.) 8vo., 1895. Price 17s. 
