These distinctions proposed by the late Dr. Solander are found conformable, in a particular degree, with the classification observable in the cabinet of M. de Colonne. The shells of M. de Colonne, it appears, were thus arranged by the celebrated Conchologist M. Favanne. They have, nevertheless, we believe, passed unnoticed by any of the modern writers upon this subject. The distinctions are certainly obvious, and might probably fully authorize their separation into species: it must be at least admitted that as varieties of the same species they are strikingly distinct. Having so far treated upon the generical distinctions of Voluta Pyrum, and pointed out the differences that exist among its principal supposed varieties, we arrive at another point of view in which the history of this shell becomes no less important, or less worthy of our consideration: the sacred character which from some superstitious causes, remote beyond all research of the present race of men, this shell has acquired in the Mythology of the Indian Nations: in the rites and worship of the Indian Brahma. Among these people this shell is called the CHANK, or SACRED CHANK, the emblem of an attribute of the divine power, and is constantly seen in one of the hands of the Indian Deity Vishnu, as a type of the renovation of the earth from the waters of the deluge.—The cause of this catastrophe of the earth, the deluge, they attribute to the wickedness of mankind in remote ages, which incensing the divine Brahma, he caused a flood of the waters to overflow the earth and destroy every vestige of the creation, animate and inanimate, that existed upon its surface. After awhile the supreme Brahma disposed to restore creation, commanded Vishnu to deliver the earth from the flood of waters, and in testimony of its deliverance Vishnu bears in his hand the Chank Shell, the symbol of its renovation.[14]