In the collection of Lord Valentia is a four-sided cast in brass, resembling a kind of pyramid, consisting of three low platforms, each bearing idols, and surmounted at the summit by a tortoise. In several Indian paintings mythologically adverting to the subject of the creation, the tortoise is represented raising the new-born earth upon its back above the waters, and it is usually seen in other mythological paintings of the same subject bearing the throne upon which Vishnu is seated, while the attendants, personified by various beings, are lifting the earth from the deep. Such a painting was once in the celebrated collection of Colonel Stuart: and we need no other evidence to shew that the bronze of Lord Valentia’s collection is of the same mythological nature, and referable to the deluge, than to observe the Chank Shell placed at each of the four corners of the ornament. We may comprehend the allusion of the tortoise raising the earth from the waters of the deluge, from a trait of the ancient Chinese astronomy; by the tortoise bearing the earth, they intended the north pole of the ecliptic, which, at the time of the deluge, they maintained had not materially changed its position, and that by this means the world was sustained and saved from utter annihilation. An Indian painting, mentioned by Mr. Edward Moor, the author of the Hindoo Pantheon, presents us with another deity, Sivi, who holds the Chank Shell in one of his four hands, and the antelope (moon) in another. There is also an Indian painting of Devi, who appears holding a Chank Shell, furnished on each side with a lateral lappit or wing: this symbol he holds in one hand, and the wheel, the emblem of the universe, in the other; and in a bronze of Vishnu, in the India House, we find the Chank Shell ornamented in a similar manner.