“Precisely. To protect ourselves from too strong a light or an unpleasant odor, we shut our pupils and stop up our nose. The snail, if the light troubles or some smell displeases it, sheathes eyes and nose in their covering; it puts them into its pocket, as Emile says.” “It is an ingenious way,” Claire remarked. “You said, too,” interposed Jules, “that the horns served it as a blindman’s cane.” “The animal is blind when it has drawn in its upper tentacles, partly or wholly; it then has only the two lower ones, which explore objects by the touch better than does the cane of a blind man, for they are very sensitive. The two upper tentacles, besides their functions of eye and nose, also play the part of blindman’s cane, or, better still, that of a finger that touches and recognizes objects. You see, little Emile, one does not know everything about a snail when one knows its wail on the fire.” “I see. Who of us would have suspected that those horns are eyes, nose, blindman’s cane, fingers, all at the same time?” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER LXXII MOTHER-OF-PEARL AND PEARLS “SOME of the shells you have just shown us,” said Jules, “shine inside like the handle of that pretty penknife you bought me the day of the fair—you know?—that four-bladed penknife with the mother-of-pearl handle.” “That is plain enough. Mother-of-pearl, that pretty substance that shines with all the colors of the rainbow, comes from certain shells. We use for delicate ornamentation what was once the dwelling of a glairy animal, near relation to the oyster. Truly, this dwelling is a veritable palace in richness. It shines with all imaginable tints, as if the rainbow had deposited its colors there. “This is the shell that furnishes the most beautiful mother-of-pearl. It is called the meleagrina margaritifera. Outside it is wrinkled and blackish-green; inside it is smoother than polished marble, richer in color than the rainbow. All tints are found there, bright, but soft and changeable, according to the point of view.” “That superb shell is the house of a miserable, slimy animal! In fairy tales the fairies themselves have none to equal it. Oh! how beautiful, how beautiful it is!” “Every one has his portion in this world. The slimy animal has for his a splendid palace of mother-of-pearl.” “Where does the meleagrina live?” “In the seas that wash the shores of Arabia.” [Illustration: Meleagrina (avicula) margaritifera] “Is Arabia very far away?” inquired Emile. “Very far, my dear. Why do you ask?” “Because I should like to pick up a lot of these beautiful shells.” “Don’t dream of such a thing. It is too far away, and, besides, they are not to be gathered by every one that wants them. To get the meleagrina men have to dive to the bottom of the sea, and some of them never come up again.”