The arrangement of shells in a cabinet must d pend, in a great degree, on the taste and fortune the collector. If ornament be the object in view, will be indispensably necessary to have the shel placed in glass cases, where they may be distinct seen. But where a collection of shells is formed f amusement, they may be kept in drawers, each sp cies placed in a paper case, or in a cup of woo glass, or porcelain, with a label attached, intimati its name, and the place from whence it was obtaine In this manner, both univalves and bivalves may conveniently disposed. But, as many of the form are very small in size, it is often necessary to f them on pieces of card, that they may be preserve and rendered easier of inspection. Perhaps the be mode of keeping these small shells, even the micr scopic species, is to have a cabinet with slips of woo made to slide horizontally: these slips may be fro one to three inches in breadth, and covered wi white paper. Upon the middle of these the shel are fixed with a solution of gum arabic and a litt sugar, and the same marked on the edge. In mar loases, when the shells are very minute, a narro strip of coloured paper may be fixed along the mi dle of the slip, to which the shells are to be attache When neighbouring species are thus brought togethe they can be easily examined with a lens. As a co venient and neat and useful method of keeping th smaller univalves, the writer of this article can r commend it from experience. It may be used wit equal advantage by the botanist to preserve th

the end of the sixteenth century, many ins began to form collections of testaceous the first museum of this kind, of any cone, was begun by Benedict Ceruto, and afteragmented by Calceolari. An account of the ns contained in it was published by Olivi, and, in 1622, Chiocco published plates of s. After this period, in proportion as colof testaceous bodies became numerous, works on shells made their appearance. were not published for any scientific object, ely to teach collectors the names of the difspecimens in their museums. As works of , we may mention the Historia Naturalis of n-the Gazophylacium Nature of Petiverpoinshe Rariteitkamer of Rumphius-and the toonel der Nature of Vincent. And, to this might add many modern works, which are Systems of Conchology'.

arious impositions are practised by dealers in the young collector should first possess himsome well defined species of each genus, to he may be enabled to refer in all cases of ty, when he is about to purchase shells, or to them in his cabinet. These may be obtained sonable terms of MR. MAWE, 149, Strand, collection abounds in rare and valuable spe: and here the young conchologist will be sure with useful information relative to this pleasing

2.

Fossil Shells.

ls are frequently found under ground, in places note from the sea, in mines, and even on the f mountains; but how they should come thither

plement to Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. iii, part 1, p. 287, achology.

is a circumstance concerning which there is much d vision among naturalists. The most rational opinio is, that those parts have been formerly sea, or at lea have been overflown thereby; and many even g back as far as the grand deluge for this. Other take these to be the natural places of their birth formation, some of them being found little other tha crude clay, others of the same texture with the roo to which they grow, though some seem of as absolu a shelly substance as any in the sea. In effect, the say, these may be only so many different gradation of nature, which can as well produce shells in min as in the sea, there being no want of saline or earth particles for the purpose; nor is there any gre difference between some sorts of spars and sea shell Fossil shells are found to be of great use in manurin land, and are extensively employed in France f this purpose.

Of these shells, some are found remaining almo entirely in their native state, but others are various altered, by being impregnated with particles of ston and of other minerals. In the place of others there found mere stone or spar, or some other native miner body, expressing all their lineaments in the greate nicety, having derived their form wholly from ther the shell having been first deposited in some solid m trix, and thence dissolved by very slow degrees, th matter having been left in its place, in the cavities stone and other solid substances, out of which she had been dissolved and washed away: these su stances, so filling the cavities, being necessarily of t same form as that of the shell, to the absence of whi the cavity was owing, though all the nicer lineamen may not be so exactly expressed. Besides these, have also in many places masses of stone form within various shells; and these having been receiv into the cavities of the shells while they were p

part of the shell, when the shell itself should away, or perished from their outside. The species we find of these are in many genera rous as the known recent ones; and as we our own island not only the shells of our pres, but those of many other very distant o we have also many species, and those in mbers, which are, in their recent state, the nts of other yet unknown or unsearched seas res. The cockles, muscles, oysters, and the ommon bivalves of our own seas, are very nt; but we have also an amazing number of tilus kind, particularly of the nautilus græconich though a shell not found living in our - any neighbouring seas, yet is found buried ur clay-pits about London and elsewhere; and st frequent of all fossil shells, in some of our es, are the concha anomia, which yet we -y know of in any part of the world in their reate. Of the cornua ammonis and the gryphitæ, everal of the echinita and others, no recent ues are known.

exact similitude of the known shells, recent ssil, in their several kinds, will by no means us to believe that these, though not yet known in their living state, are, as some have idly nt, a sort of lusus naturæ. It is certain, that, of any known shores, very few, not even those Town island, have been yet carefully searched e shell-fish that inhabit them; and as we see nautilus græcorum an instance of shells being ght from very distant parts of the world to be d there, we cannot wonder that yet unknown =s, or the unknown bottoms of deep seas, should furnished us with many unknown shell-fish, h may have been brought with the rest; whether were at the time of the general deluge, or the t of any other catastrophe of a like kind, or by tever other means to be left in the yet unhardened ter of our stony and clayey strata.

Select Books on Eonchology.

To those who are about to enter on the pleasing study of shells, would recommend the two following publications :-Burrow's Eleme of Conchology, according to the Linnæan System; with 28 Pla drawn from Nature, and a List of Conchological Writers, 8vo, 2d ed an extremely useful book; and Wodarch's Introduction to the St of Conchology, 8vo, with 4 coloured Plates, a pleasant and attract work. Brown's Conchology, 8vo.-Graves's Naturalist's Pocket Bo 8vo, to which we are indebted;-and Mawe's Shell-Collectors' Pi 12mo. Other works for the more advanced student and collector a Montagu's Testacea Britannica; or, Natural History of British She Marine, Land, and Fresh water, including the most minute, system cally arranged and embellished with Figures, 4to, 2 vols. and Supp ment; an extremely important and interesting book.-Pennant's tish Zoology, vol. 4.-Donovan's British Shells, 8vo, 5 vols. with most beautifully coloured Plates.-The fourth Volume of Dr. Turto Translation of Linnæus's System of Nature.-Wood's Index Tes ceologicus; or, Catalogue of Shells, British and Foreign, arranged cording to the Linnæan System, with the Latin and English Nam and References to Figures and Places where found.-Swainson's Exo Conchology, with Plates.-See also the Article Conchology in the S plement to the Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. iii, part 1, and in Bre ster's Cyclopædia, vol. vii, from both of which we have derived m valuable information; and to these excellent essays we refer for account of the various alterations that have taken place in the cla fication of shells since the time of Linnæus, as well as for an estima of the comparative merits of the new systems. For full particulars Fossil Shells, with some most interesting Plates, consult Parkinso Organic Remains of a Former World, 4to, 3 vols.