Part 12

So we make our way along the dusty highroad, that leads from Torquay southward, skirting the shore, now and then getting peeps of the rocks and the retiring tide, over the massive sea-walls, as the successive coves open and again shut-in by bounding hedgerows as we cross the bases of the intervening headlands. Wild hyacinths are peeping among the rank foliage of the arums and nettles; and harts-tongue ferns, and primroses are everywhere, clustering in great masses, or studding the green banks in single stars; the bright rose-campion smiles, and the ever lovely germander speedwell, brightest, sweetest of spring flowers, gladdens us here and there, like “angels’ eyes,” as our rustics poetically call these pretty azure flowers.

As we proceed, we pause to wipe our foreheads, and turning round, see Torquay behind us, covering and crowning its amphitheatre of hills, like a queenly city, surely the most beauteous of all our watering-places;--and beyond it on the left, we see the old church tower of Marychurch, on its elevated plateau, standing out massive and dark against the sky.

We pass through the outskirts of the long straggling village of Paignton, and mark how picturesquely it is embosomed in the midst of its apple orchards; the old-fashioned cottages buried in the trees, so that only the time-stained roofs of brown thatch rise here and there, like islets in a wide sea of blushing blossom. And now extensive osier grounds lie on either side; the young tender-green shoots, the hope of the harvest, rising thickly from the uncouth pollard stumps; while the still water glimmers everywhere around their roots.

A narrow lane leads off abruptly on our left, into which we turn, and in a moment are in a mossy, flowery, ferny region. The open gate of a villa reveals a little girl “perambulating” a baby amid the bowers and blossoms of a sweet garden, whose numerous old tamarisk trees, rough and bristling, guard the wall, just breaking into their plumy foliage. And then we open the expanse of shore and sea, and the wheels of the carriage are suddenly six inches deep in the soft sand. How brightly the wide silver sea is glancing and sparkling under the climbing sun! Scarcely a breeze breaks its mirrory face, though far out in the offing lines and bands of deep blue show that there are intermitting puffs ruffling the water; and the craft that creep along the horizon have evidently got a working breeze, though the yachts in the half-distance sit like white swans, their motionless prows pointing every way, and “floating double,” on the molten looking-glass.

GOODRINGTON SANDS.

These are the Goodrington Sands; for there on the left is the projecting bluff of red sandstone, horizontally stratified, known as Roundham Head, and beyond it in the distance we see Hope’s Nose, and its two guardian islets, the Orestone and the Thatcher. On the other side, the long wall of land terminating in Berry Head projects to an equal distance, and we are in the bottom of the deep bight, nearly equidistant from both.

Immediately in front of the debouchure of the little green lane, beginning some way down the beach, and stretching away into the sea, there is a mass of low black rock, leprous with barnacles, and draped with ragged tufts of oar-weed and tangle and bladder-wrack, sweltering and blackening in the sun. It is much broken up, and narrow winding lanes paved with sand pierce it in all directions; and shallow pools of quiet water sleep everywhere in the hollows. Sweet little sea-gardens are these pools: bright green leaves of ulva float like tinted cambric in the water; tufts of chondrus are glittering with steely reflections of gemmeous blue; large broad leaves of dulse, richly, darkly red, afford fine contrasts with the green sea-lettuce; and one and all give ample shelter to thousands of vigilant, busy, happy, living creatures. It is treacherous walking; for the footing is very uneven, and the glare of the sun on the water renders it difficult to see where to tread; while the advance and recess of the wavelets on the sand between, give to the bewildered brain the impression that everything is sliding from under the foot.

PAIGNTON COCKLE.

What is that object that lies on yonder stretch of sand, over which the shallow water ripples, washing the sand around it and presently leaving it dry? It looks like a stone; but there is a fine scarlet knob on it; which all of a sudden has disappeared. Let us watch the moment of the receding wave, and run out to it. It is a fine example of the great spinous cockle, for which all these sandy beaches that form the bottom of the great sea-bend of Torbay are celebrated. Indeed the species is scarcely known elsewhere; so that it is often designated in books as the Paignton cockle. A right savoury bonne bouche it is, when artistically dressed. Old Dr. Turton, a great authority in his day for Devonshire natural history, especially in matters relating to shells and shell-fish, says that the cottagers about Paignton well know the “red noses,” as they call the great cockles, and search for them at the low spring-tides, when they may be seen lying in the sand with the fringed siphons appearing just above the surface. They gather them in baskets and panniers, and after cleansing them a few hours in cold spring-water, fry the animals in a batter made of crumbs of bread. The creatures have not changed their habits nor their habitats; for they are still to be seen in the old spots just as they were a century ago: nor have they lost their reputation; they are indeed promoted to the gratification of more refined palates now, for the cottagers, knowing on which side their bread is buttered, collect the sapid cockles for the fashionables of Torquay, and content themselves with the humbler and smaller species, which rather affects the muddy flats of estuaries than sand beaches, though not uncommon here. This latter, though much inferior in sapidity to the great spinous sort, forms a far more important item in the category of human food, from its very general distribution, its extreme abundance, and the ease with which it is collected. Wherever the receding tide leaves an area of exposed mud, the common cockle is sure to be found; and hundreds of men, women, and children, may be seen plodding and groping over the stinking surface, with naked feet and bent backs, picking up the shell-fish by thousands, to be boiled and eaten for home consumption, or to be cried through the lanes and alleys of the neighbouring towns by stentorian boys, who vociferate all day long,--“Here’s your fine cockles, here! Here they are! Here they are! Twopence a quart!”

COCKLE-FISHING.

It is on the north-western coasts of Scotland, however, that the greatest abundance of these mollusca occurs, and there they form not a luxury, but even a necessary of life to the poor semi-barbarous population. The inhabitants of those rocky regions enjoy an unenviable notoriety for being habitually dependent on this mean diet. “Where the river meets the sea at Tongue,” says Macculloch, “there is a considerable ebb, and the long sand-banks are productive of cockles in an abundance which is almost unexampled. At that time (a year of scarcity) they presented every day at low water a singular spectacle, being crowded with men, women, and children, who were busily employed in digging for these shell-fish as long as the tide permitted. It was not unusual also to see thirty or forty horses from the surrounding country, which had been brought down for the purpose of carrying away loads of them to distances of many miles. This was a well-known season of scarcity, and, without this resource, I believe it is not too much to say, that many individuals must have died for want.”

The isles of Barra and North Uist, in the Hebrides, possess also enormous resources of the same character. “It is not easy to calculate,” says Mr. Wilson, “the amount of such beds of shell-fish, but we may mention that, during a period of great distress which prevailed a good many years ago, all the families in the island (then about two hundred in number) resorted, for the sake of this food, to the great sands at the northern end of Barra. It was computed that, for a couple of summers at the time alluded to, no less than from one hundred to two hundred horse-loads were taken at low water every day of the spring-tides during the months of May, June, July, and August. We were pleased to hear it observed that the shell-fish are always most abundant in years of scarcity.”

These Barra beds are of great antiquity. A very old writer, Dean Monro, thus notices them:--“This ile is full of grate cokills, and alledgit be the auncient countrymen that the same cokills comes down out of the foresaid hill throw the said strype in the first smalle forme that wee have spokyn of, and aftir theyr comying down to the sandes growis grate cokills allways. Ther is no fayrer and more profytable sandes for cokills in all the worlde.”

But all this time our fair “cokill” has been lying at our feet, snapping, and gaping, and thrusting forth and back his great coral foot, waiting our leisure to take him up. No longer shall he be neglected. The bivalve shell is a fine solid house of stone, massive, strong, and heavy, elegantly fluted with prominent ribs that radiate regularly on both valves from the curved beaks, which ribs are beset with polished spiny points. The hues of the shell are attractive, though not at all showy; they consist of tints of yellowish and reddish browns, rich and warm, arranged in concentric bands, and gradually fading to a creamy white at the beaks. Unlike the scallops, the cockles have the two valves alike in shape, and from the bent beaks meeting each other, and the curvature of the outline, they present, when viewed endwise, a very regular and beautiful heart-shape, whence the scientific name of the genus is derived, Cardium, from καρδία, the heart.

The animal which inhabits this strong fortress is handsomer than bivalves usually are. The leaves of the mantle are thick and convex, corresponding to the shell-valves; the edges are strongly fringed in the neighbourhood of the siphons, which are short tubes of considerable diameter, soldered, as it were, together. The mantle has a soft spongy character towards its edges, but towards the back, where it lines the valves, it is very thin and almost membranous. The hue of the former parts is very rich, a fine brilliant orange, with the shaggy fringe of tentacles paler; the siphons are also orange, with the inner surface of the tubes white, having a pearly gleam.

FOOT OF THE COCKLE.

But what was that scarlet knob that we saw protruded and retracted but now? Ha! as it lies, slightly gaping, the lips of the mantle recede, and we catch a peep within of the gorgeous colour. Suddenly the valves open to their full extent, like the folding doors of a drawing-room, allowing exit to a richly dressed lady. Here comes the vermilion tenant! Place for my lady! But what is she? And what is she about to do in her gorgeous raiment? Nay; ’tis but the cockle’s foot; a monopod he is: this is all the foot he has. It is clad in neither shoe nor stocking; and truly it needs it not. Never was the silken-hosed foot of cardinal arrayed like this. But see to what an extent the organ protrudes! four inches from the valves’ edges does its tip reach; smooth, lubricous, taper, with a knee at the upper part, and the toe bent in the form of a hook. As to its general appearance when thus extended, I have compared it to a finger of polished carnelian; but Mr. Kingsley thinks that this resemblance will not hold, the foot being too opaque for that gem: he likens it to a long capsicum, which is, however, too dull and too dark; and he tells a story of a certain (mythic, I fear) countess who, seeing it for the first time, exclaimed, “Oh, dear! I always heard that my pretty red coral came out of a fish, and here it is, all alive!”

Nay; after all, it is what it is; and those comparisons just help one who has never seen it, to form some conception of its appearance; but by one who has, all will be rejected as inadequate.

And as to what the brilliant organ is going to do, that we see. For the long taper foot being thrust to its utmost, feels about for some resisting surface, that stone, half buried in the sand, for instance; which no sooner does it feel than the hooked point is pressed stiffly against it, the whole foot by muscular contraction is made suddenly rigid, and the entire creature,--mantle, siphons, foot, shell and all--is jerked away in an uncouth manner, “quite permiscous,” as the fisherman hard-by says, to a distance of some foot or more. But the cockle can leap on occasion much more vigorously; one has been seen to throw itself clear over the gunwale of a boat when laid on the bottom-boards.

ITS BURROWING FUNCTION.

Thus we see one use of the hooked tip is to afford a stronger spring; but it has a more direct bearing on the burrowing habits of the animal. Like all the rest of its beautiful tribe, this species is a dweller in the deep sand, into which it can penetrate with considerable power and rapidity. In order to do this, the foot is straightened, and the sharp point is thrust perpendicularly down into the wet sand. The muscular force exerted is sufficient to penetrate the soft sand to the whole length, when the point is suddenly bent sidewise, thus obtaining a strong holdfast. The whole organ is now strongly contracted in length, and the animal and shell are dragged forcibly to the mouth of the burrow, the edges of the valves downward and piercing the sand a little way. The straightened point is then pushed an inch or two farther down; again hooked, and another pull is made. The shell descends a little farther into the yielding sand, and the same interchange of processes goes on till the animal is sufficiently buried. To read this description you would suppose it a most clumsy, and ineffective, and slow business; but indeed this is very far from its character. The elongations and contractions are made with great rapidity; and almost with the quickness of thought the unwieldy cockle, when in full vigour and thoroughly alarmed, disappears into his sandy fortress; so fast, indeed, that you must be very alert to overtake him and prevent his descent, if you have no appliances but your two hands.

Cuvier, in his elaborate and beautiful dissections of the Mollusca, has demonstrated that this important organ is mainly composed of an immense multitude of muscles, circular, longitudinal, and transverse, wonderful in their complexity and arrangement, but most perfectly adapted to impart variety, force, and precision to its movements. In these respects the human tongue perhaps presents the closest parallel to its organization. It is remarkable that at its upper or basal part it is hollow, and encloses some of the viscera of the body.

BANDED VENUS.

Here, under this low-lying ledge of rock, is another shell, which in beauty perhaps excels even the gorgeous cockle. It belongs to a genus pre-eminent for loveliness, to which the name of the Goddess of Love has been assigned. This is the Banded Venus. The most prominent and obvious character is that the shell-valves are covered with ribs, more or less strongly marked, which, instead of running fan-like from the beaks to the edges, as in the cockles, are concentric, being parallel with the edges. In this species these ribs are well marked, about a dozen in number, broad, flat, sharply defined, and nearly equally distant. They impart to the shell, which is very convex, and nearly round, an aspect of great strength combined with elegance. The colours, too, are very ornamental: broad bands of brownish lilac, varied with warmer tints, widening as they go, radiate from the beaks to the margins, relieved by a whitish ground. The hues vary in different individuals; the bands being sometimes rusty brown, or purple; and the ground yellow, or pale orange; and the contrasts are in some better marked than in others; but when fresh and unrubbed the shell is always a beautiful one.

PLATE 10.

P. H. GOSSE, del. LEIGHTON, BROS.

SPINOUS COCKLE. BANDED VENUS. ]

The specimen before us is alive. I will drop it into this shallow pool in the rock. See, the valves are opening, and a large foot of a waxy whiteness, almost semi-pellucid, protrudes, thicker and more ovate than that of the cockle, but not capable of such elongation. The siphons, however, are proportionally longer; they are separate at their extremities, and project considerably from the shell.