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I have before my eyes some species of the genus Terebra, from New Caledonia. They are extremely tapering cones, attaining almost nine inches in length. Their surface is smooth and quite plain, without any of the usual ornaments, such as furrows, knots or strings of pearls. The spiral edifice is superb, graced with its own simplicity alone.
At a lower part in the same rock, less compact, I found a beautiful chalcedonic cast, apparently of a terebra. The calcareous sandstone consisted of grains of quartz cemented by calcareous spar, and contained fragments of shells of the littorina or turbo.* Acacia pendula FIRST SEEN.
It is, moreover, contrasted with the Suffolk Crag by the indications it affords of an extra-European climate. Thus it contains seven species of Cypraea, some larger than any existing cowry of the Mediterranean, several species of Oliva, Ancillaria, Mitra, Terebra, Pyrula, Fasciolaria, and Conus.
If a geologist were to find in latitude 39 degrees on the coast of Portugal a bed containing numerous shells belonging to three species of Oliva, to a Voluta, and Terebra, he would probably assert that the climate at the period of their existence must have been tropical; but, judging from South America, such an inference might be erroneous.
He would tell my uncle Toby of the Catapultae of the Syrians, which threw such monstrous stones so many hundred feet, and shook the strongest bulwarks from their very foundation: he would go on and describe the wonderful mechanism of the Ballista which Marcellinus makes so much rout about! the terrible effects of the Pyraboli, which cast fire; the danger of the Terebra and Scorpio, which cast javelins.
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