THE

GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE.

APRIL 1892.

THE GOLDEN SNAIL.

BY ARMIGER BARCZINSKY.

PART I.-THE SECRET.

LUCK, good and bad, is an element of existence, I suppose.

Rules the most fixed are swayed by it; circumstances the most exact are affected by it; facts, events, incidents and accidents occur or not as fortune favours; and therefore in the one word Luck we sum up the multitude of combinations and uncertainties which govern life.

A large proportion of mankind admit this: they are the less fortunate. Those who have succeeded do not: to them it is an excuse born of calamity to which they are under no obligation.

If there be some uneventful lives with which fortune, good or bad, seems to have little affinity, yet I doubt whether there exists a man unable to ascribe his lot in life-the one great event which comes to each and shapes his ends-to chance.

Twenty years ago I did not think as I do now. Up to that time I had been independent of fortune and disregarded it as a principle of the system of existence. My life then was a monotony: not that I found fault with it, no; I was entirely satisfied, my nature abhorred change and novelty. To live in the same place, find my food one day as another, study the same things and take the same walks left me nothing else to wish for.

I am an old man now, shattered in health and very feeble; even my spirit, which at one time I would have defied anything to break, is now utterly gone from me. Poor I always was; men whose whole soul and being are absorbed in study and research as mine have been seldom seek wealth.

VOL. CCLXXII. NO. 1936.

That is as it should be. Gold will not buy wisdom, unless it be that of the schools, and for that I never yearned; books I did not need, teachers I had in plenty. Nature was ever an open leaf to me, and everything in Nature taught me something. For I am a student in Natural History in its many phases, Conchology interesting me most deeply.

When one is poor and a devotee of science, the world holds one cheaply. What knowledge I had was undervalued and underpaid; if I did not quite starve at times it was only because my needs were small. The world and Nature are ever battling one against the other. Man destroys all things for the gold or comfort they bring him, and gives the smallest wage to those who tell him how to find and utilise Nature's treasures. Perhaps it is best so. All men are not inquirers after truth; few but desire wealth. Ah! had I but remembered that I was of the few-in time! Had I but given a thought that I was not fitted to grapple with the world in its thirst after worldly treasure, surely then I should have still been happyhappy as an old man need be with enough of food and warmth and memory of earlier knowledge!

When one is near sixty years of age, it is too late to begin to change one's style of life, one's very nature; alas, that wisdom goes not hand in hand with years! I speak not of experience as the world has it that I never possessed unless it were of living things, their ways and inner life.

But let me tell you who I am. My name is Amer Stol, and I am a Hollander. Yet am I English too, if twenty years spent in your country count for anything. Twenty pleasant years they were, albeit passed in semi-poverty and loneliness; for my work brought me but a scanty livelihood and no friends.

I was a young man-thirty-five-when I left my native town of Weert, which is on the banks of the Buyl. A desire to see the world took me to your great city of London; a sight of your great museums and storehouses of natural treasures attracted me and gave me a desire to remain in England. One who knows his subject well need. not be idle; I easily acquired your language and found work in classifying collections and revising works bearing on the subject with which I was familiar.

Thus I spent twenty years, living always in the same house; my room, high up above the smoke and noises of the city, knew of no inmate but myself. It was a poor place, scantily furnished, hot in summer, cold in winter, for the roof only separated me from the sun's rays or the frosts and snows. In it I had, however, stored a goodly

quantity of those objects with which a naturalist loves to surround himself. Specimens of ores, plants, fossils, and many shells. The dustheap, the gutter, the neighbouring chalk cliffs of Kent and Surrey, the sweepings of sale-rooms had each contributed something to my collection. For twenty years it increased in size and to me in interest, still it contained no object of undue importance or worth until I brought home the THING, the small piece of material substance, which was to bring me joy, wealth and-despair!

I will tell you how it befell me to gain possession of this addition to my collection. Too poor to buy, I yet could not refrain from attending a great sale of geological and other specimens which I had seen advertised. Among the foremost, and nearest the trays and cases in the sale-room, a fragment of shell caught my attention. I had no sooner taken it in my hand for nearer examination than I was hustled from the heap on which it had reposed. Regarding it carefully, my attention at once became fixed on seeing that it was of an order with which I was unfamiliar. My growing interest soon developed into abstraction as I tried unsuccessfully to find its name and species. I thought no more of the other and costlier objects. surrounding me, I paid no attention to the eager bidding for rare specimens, I heeded not the moving throng of buyers and collectors in whose midst I stood. Unconsciously I made my way out, the shell still in my hand, and returned to my room in the clouds.

The sight of the familiar objects of my home brought back my thoughts to commonplace matters. I looked at the shell and experienced an uneasy feeling at still having it in my possession; but as I gazed at the fragment-for it was nothing more-and noticed it was not labelled, my fears gradually left me. "No one could set store on so small a thing," I said; and yet I was beginning to value it exceedingly, it was so strange to me.

That evening I spent hours in attempting to classify my new specimen. That it belonged to the group Pedifera, class Gasteropoda, I felt nearly sure. It would have been no disgrace to have mistaken so small a piece and determined it Brachiopoda or Conchifera; but I did not fall into this error, as you will hear. To give it its proper order seemed a task beyond my powers; its family I did not even attempt to guess at. I could get no further.

Deep in thought I began to rub the shell gently between finger and thumb; in doing so I removed a thin layer of dirt which coated it. Presently on its outside and concave surface a fine deep blue tint revealed itself. I turned it over, and started as I noticed the inner side covered with minute spots of what looked like gold. I

was completely mystified. Quickly I fetched a strong magnifying glass through which the spotted surface had the appearance of a thin layer of metal with thicker and slightly tuberculated portions scattered over it.

The adornment of a shell with gold is very unusual, at least I had never heard of it, and I wondered greatly. Presently I remembered I had some aquafortis in my room, and without delay applied it to the shell. In a few moments the acid had eaten into the remaining patches of dirt, and brought the pure gold-for such it undoubtedly was-into stronger and brighter relief than before. To a student of Nature this result was as stupefying as it was interesting. I was both pleased and puzzled; I did not dare to hope that I had discovered a new Gasteropod, for I assumed that some foolish person was to blame for this embellishment, this gilding of the rose, if so I may express myself. "But why on the inside?" I asked myself. "Would not a jeweller have chosen the exterior for adornment of this kind?" But I could not supply an answer. A multitude of conjectures, however, presented themselves. The rough inner surface may have caught up small particles of the metal, and these had possibly adhered to it. The entire shell itself might, perhaps, have been used by a goldsmith as a vessel for containing gold; even the fact of dentists using the precious metal in its pure state occurred to me, and many other surmises; but when I remembered the apparent rarity of the shell itself, all these inferences would vanish. For many days the shell occupied my thoughts, but I had no success in the identification of it. In the mean time I resumed my daily labours, and amongst the great collections of the museums and of private persons by whom I was sometimes engaged, sought for a clue to my Gasteropod.

I have said I had no friends; my acquaintances were very few. It was an event for me to come across an occasional compatriot engaged in similar work to my own, and only one or two had I met thus. One, a metallurgist, had been a lodger for a brief period in the house I occupied. I had not seen him for more than a year, perhaps two-I did not count time by his absence. About six months after I had found my shell he suddenly returned, and sought his old lodging. He had been in the Dutch East Indies engaged as assayer on a gold-mine, until ill-health compelled him to return; he was going to Australia as soon as he could hear of something to do there.

“And you, old fossil," was his greeting, "how goes it with you? have you found the philosopher's stone yet, or discovered the elixir of life? To look at you one would say you badly needed both."

I told him he was mistaken, gold I did not value much, that I was contented to live mindful of death.

"Enough, and more than enough, seems to be your motto, my friend," he said. "Well, it is much to be satisfied; I cannot say I want for nothing," and he laughed.

"You are young, Van Earp, and youth is not easily satisfied, I suppose," was my rejoinder.

"Not if I be an illustration of youth, Mynheer Stol. No; only fools are contented in this world-pardon me, you allow you are no longer young."

He paused thoughtfully and then continued in an eager tone:

"Do you know it is discontent that brings wealth: to be satisfied is to avoid good fortune. If I have a thing, I want more of it; if I succeed in obtaining more, then I desire more still. The poor have to be satisfied, the rich never are; poor I am not, and will not be, for I am discontented and my discontent shall bring me wealth!"

His face was full of determination as he spoke. I thought to myself of the great difference there was between us, he, keen in his desire for gold, possibly unscrupulous in his quest for it, I totally uninterested in its acquirement, not even desiring it; yet I said, smiling:

"You long for wealth, Van Earp, I possess it."

"You! you have riches!" he exclaimed, looking at me from head to foot and adding scoffingly, "you do not carry them about with you, I fancy."

"That I do," I laughed, "for they consist of a little knowledge, and much contentment."

"Pah!" he exclaimed with scorn, "do they give you ease and comfort, luxury and power? What do they weigh against GOLD, the one and only thing worth living for? See," he continued, fingering his watch-chain and holding it out towards me, "here is an emblem of the best of earthly treasures. Nature's brightest jewel, A GOLDEN SNAIL!"

I looked, and my breath came quick, my pulses beat fast, my heart thumped within my breast, my throat grew suddenly dry so that I could not speak, for extended towards me Van Earp held a small and beautiful shell, dark blue in colour, whose exterior to the edge of the lip glittered with the brightest gold. In the space of a moment I recognised what it was. He had in his possession a perfect specimen of the Gasteropod with which my fragment was identical! And it was a Gasteropod of the order Pulmonata, family Helicidæ, a true snail; and quicker than thought I knew its lining was the work of Nature and not of man's embellishment.