22 
EDIBLE BRITISH MOLLUSKS. 
races. The rival snails were placed at the foot of a post^ 
and the one that first reaehed the top, won the land for 
its master. In the Isle of Wight, the fishermen of 
Atherfield and Brixton consider snails tlie best bait for 
prawns, and horseflesh next. 
The shells of Helix pomatia are nsed for making small 
whistles for children. The apex of the shell is cut off, 
and a piece of tin added ; they are then sold for a penny 
each; and who does not recollect the wonderful cats 
made of the shells of the common garden snail, Helix 
aspersa, with heads of cement or putty, and how anxious 
we were to become possessors of these beautiful crea- 
tures ! They are now seldom seen, except in some small 
out-of-the-way shop in a eountry town or village, — such 
trifles not suiting the tastes of the precocious juveniles 
of the present day. 
The ancients seem to have studied the habits of these 
mollusks, as besides Theophrastus, whom I have already 
quoted, Aristotle also mentions them ; and Teucer speaks 
of the snail as an animal destitute of feet and spine 
and bone, whose back is clad with horny shell, with 
long projecting and retreating eyes,^^* and many others. 
Hesiod calls the snail the hero that carries his house 
on his back,^^ and Anaxilas says — 
“ You are e’en more distrustful than a snail, 
Who fears to leave even his house behind him.”t 
Somewhat different is the old English proverbial rhyme, 
“ Good wives to snails should be akin, 
Always to keep their homes within ; 
Yet unlike snails they should not pack 
All they are worth upon their back.” 
* Athenseus, ‘ Deipnosophists,’ book x. c. 83, p. 720. 
t Ibid., book ii. c. 63, p. 104. 
