The Malays of the East Indian islands eat _Telescopium fuscum_ and _Pyrazus palustris_, which abound in the mangrove swamps. They throw them on their wood fires, and when they are sufficiently cooked, break off the top of the spire and suck the animal out through the opening. _Haliotis_ they take out of the shell, string together, and dry in the sun. The lower classes in the Philippines eat _Arca inaequivalvis_, boiling them as we do mussels.[216] In the Corean islands a species of _Monodonta_ and another of _Mytilus_ are quite peppery, and bite the tongue; our own _Helix revelata_, as I can vouch from personal experience, has a similar flavour. _Fusus colosseus_, _Rapana bezoar_, and _Purpura luteostoma_ are eaten on the southern coasts of China; _Strombus luhuanus_, _Turbo chrysostomus_, _Trochus niloticus_, and _Patella testudinaria_, by the natives of New Caledonia; _Strombus gigas_ and _Livona pica_ in the West Indies; _Turbo niger_ and _Concholepas peruvianus_ on the Chilian coasts; four species of _Strombus_ and _Nerita_, one each of _Purpura_ and _Turbo_, besides two _Tridacna_ and one _Hippopus_, by the natives of British New Guinea. West Indian negroes eat the large Chitons which are abundant on their rocky coasts, cutting off and swallowing raw the fleshy foot, which they call ‘beef,’ and rejecting the viscera. Dried cephalopods are a favourite Chinese dish, and are regularly exported to San Francisco, where the Chinamen make them into soup. The ‘Challenger’ obtained two species of _Sepia_ and two of _Loligo_ from the market at Yokohama. The insipidity of fresh-water Mollusca renders them much less desirable as a form of food. Some species of Unionidae, however, are said to be eaten in France. _Anodonta edulis_ is specially cultivated for food in certain districts of China, and the African _Aetheriae_ are eaten by negroes. _Navicella_ and _Neritina_ are eaten in Mauritius, _Ampullaria_ and _Neritina_ in Guadeloupe, and _Paludina_ in Cambodia. The vast heaps of empty shells known as ‘kitchen-middens,’ occur in almost every part of the world. They are found in Scotland, Denmark, the east and west coasts of North America, Brazil, Tierra del Fuego, Australia and New Zealand, and are sometimes several hundred yards in length. They are invariably composed of the edible shells of the adjacent coast, mixed with bones of Mammals, birds, and fish. From their great size, it is believed that many of them must have taken centuries to form. Pre-eminent among existing shell-fish industries stands the cultivation of the oyster and the mussel, a more detailed account of which may prove interesting. The cultivation of the oyster[217] as a luxury of food dates at least from the gastronomic age of Rome. Every one has heard of the epicure whose taste was so educated that “he could tell At the first mouthful, if his oysters fed On the Rutupian or the Lucrine bed Or at Circeii.”[218]