MYTlLIDiE.— -MUSSEL. 
51 
depths when tlie man with a long pole ascertains the depth 
of the mussel-bed. This pole^ which has a sharpened end, 
is struck into the bed, and serves as the anchor or moor- 
ing for the boat ; the woman, with her arms round it, 
makes it her line of descent. With this, as a conductor, 
she slides or slips down, and soon reappears, with her 
arms crossed round the pole, but with both hands as 
full as they can hold of mussels. Having deposited her 
handfuls in the canoe, she descends again and again six 
or eight times, until her cargo is complete. Upon Cap- 
tain O’Brien’s remonstrating with a man for imposing 
such a dangerous duty upon a woman, instead of under- 
going it himself, he explained to him, that this diving 
was a privilege of the sex, and that no man would dare 
to be so unmanly as to rob a woman of her birthright. 
These Chilian, or Bay of Concepcion belles, sell their 
produce in the market for dresses and finery. 
The usual size of the common mussel is about two 
inches and a half in length, and about half that breadth ; 
but in 1862 I procured two specimens from Exmouth, 
which had been dredged, the largest measuring five 
inches in length and two and a half in breadth, the other 
four inches long and one and a quarter wide. Mr. Jef- 
freys also mentions having a specimen which measures 
nearly five inches in length. Though mussels are a 
valuable article of food, and considered wholesome, yet 
many cases of poisoning by mussels have occurred ; but 
it may generally be traced to their having been gathered 
from either the sides of docks, or piers, where there are 
copper bolts or nails, or from ships that are copper- 
bottomed ; or else from the neighbourhood of large town 
sewers, the sewerage water running over the rocks on 
which the mussels grow. In the ^ Field,’ November 
E 2 
