shells thus carried are said to be frequently found on the very summit
even of the Table Mountain. In one cavern at the point of Mussel Bay,"
he adds, "I disturbed some thousands of birds, and found as many
thousands of living shell-fish scattered on the surface of a heap of
shells, that for aught I know, would have filled as many thousand
wagons." The story, therefore, of the ancient philosopher whose bald
pate one of these unlucky birds mistook for a stone, and dropped a
shell upon it, thereby killing at once both, is not so tramontane as
to stumble all belief.

Land shells furnish a few birds with part of their sustenance, and the
principal of these are two well known songsters, the blackbird and the
thrush. They,

----"whose notes
Nice finger'd Art must emulate in vain."


depend in great measure, when winter has destroyed their summer food,
on the more common species of Hèlices (snails.) These they break very
dexterously by reiterated strokes against some stone; and it is not
uncommon to find a great quantity of fragments of shells together, as
if brought to one particulur stone for this very purpose.--_Loudon's
Magazine_.




Notes of a Reader