122 LAND AND FRESH-WATER MOLLUSKS. 
six, and M. Bouillet ninety. One pretty variety 
I have met with is of a white colour, with colour¬ 
less bands. A more permanent variety, and by 
some raised to the rank of a species under the 
technical appellation of H. hybrida, is of a more 
uniformly yellowish-brown colour, with a beauti¬ 
ful rosy lip, whitish towards the edge : it is local, 
but not rare. 
H.hortensis is a favourite food with thrushes and 
blackbirds. Every country schoolboy is familiar 
with the snail-hunting propensities of these birds. 
In a country walk one may frequently see a large 
stone surrounded by fractured snail shells; these 
are the slaughtering-blocks whereon the poor 
snail is sacrificed for the welfare of our songsters 
and their young progenies. The shells are very 
systematically broken. The bird strikes the shell 
upon the stone in such a position as to expose the 
principal mass of the snail at about the commence¬ 
ment of the last whorl, and the part immediately 
above of the preceding whorl. The shells of 
other snails, as TI. arbustorum , H. nemoralis, and 
H. aspersa , occur among the debris in the 
thrushes^ haunts; the former not so often, on 
account of its less frequency; and the latter also, 
because of the greater thickness of their shells. 
The garden snail is found apparently indi¬ 
genous on islands off the coast of Maine, North 
America; it inhabits Greenland. 
