430 
VARIOUS GENERAL USES. 
materials, while the aborigines of Port Curtis, Queensland, polish 
their spears, boomerangs and waddies with the sharp edges of broken 
shells of Heliv ciuminghami. 
Colour of a somewhat brilliant violet, used by the mural painters of 
the sixteenth century, is stated by Dumas and Persoz to have been 
yielded by finely pulverized shells of Neritina flumatilis. 
As Manure, Dreissensia polymorpha, which often exists in such 
incredible numbers within a very limited area, has been used with 
excellent effect in Lancashire for enriching the land. 
Fertilization of Flowers may probably be sometimes accomplished 
by mollusks crawling over them during cold or damp weather when 
insects are not abroad. Magnus has recorded and especially noticed 
the actuality of this process with AgrioUmax Iwvis and Chrysan- 
themum vulgare. 
Cement was made in Lister’s time by pricking the body of Helix 
aspersa and collecting the fluid exuding therefrom, which when mixed 
with an equal quantity of albumen and quicklime and well pounded, 
form a durable and excellent cement for marble or stone, hardening 
almost immediately. 
Pounded snails were used at Montpellier to moisten the wooden 
moulds, to prevent the adherence thereto of the wax figures and 
allowing them to come easily away with a fine surface, and are said 
also to have been formerly successfully utilized in the manufacture or 
adulteration of cream. 
As Food for Sheep, Helix virgata especially has long been credited 
with contributing materially to the nourishment of sheep and as 
being re.sponsible for the superior flavour of the South Down and 
Dartmoor mutton, as it is quite impossible for the sheep to pasture 
on the downs without devouring immense numbers of these snails. 
This excessive abundance of Helix virgata, in some favoured locali- 
ties, is so remarkable as to have originated the sensational reports of 
“ showers of snails,” when these animals have appeared suddenly 
from their hiding places in vast numbers after rain, following upon a 
period of dry weather. 
As Food for Fishes, the mollusks are very important and it is a very 
prevalent belief that in rivers where Unio margaritifer exists the 
trout fishing is markedly improved ; while in America the smaller 
Pisidia have been shown to form one of the most important articles 
of food of the Whitefish. According to Mr. Sturges Dodd, thq 
