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A genus of marine gastropods, including many species of limpets. The shell has the form of a flattened cone. The common European limpet (Patella vulgata) is largely used for food.

Having few spirals, or whorls; as, a paucispiral operculum or shell.

A covering; a canopy; figuratively, the sky. The pavilion of heaven is bare. Shelley.

A kind of aboriginal shell money, or wampum, of the Atlantic coast of the United States; -- originally applied only to polished white cylindrical beads.

A shelly concretion, usually rounded, and having a brilliant luster, with varying tints, found in the mantle, or between the mantle and shell, of certain bivalve mollusks, especially in the pearl oysters and river mussels, and sometimes in certain univalves. It is usually due to a secretion of shelly substance around s…

Containing pearls; abounding with, or yielding, pearls; as, pearly shells. Milton.

; also, its fruit, a smooth, oblong nut, an inch or an inch and a half long, with a thin shell and well- flavored meat. [Written also pacane.]

A sort of stem by which certain shells and barnacles are attached to other objects. See Illust. of Barnacle.

A chicken just breaking the shell; a young bird.

Of or pertaining to the sea; marine; pelagic; as, pelagian shells.

The internal shell of a squid.

per Silurian. Pentamerus limestone (Geol.), a Silurian limestone composed largely of the shells of Pentamerus.

A division of Foraminifera, including those having perforated shells.

A chitinous membrane covering the exterior of many shells; -- called also epidermis.

The lip, or edge of the aperture, of a spiral shell.

The edge of the aperture of a univalve shell.

Any small marine gastropod shell of the genus Littorina. The common European species (Littorina littorea), in Europe extensively used as food, has recently become naturalized abundantly on the American coast. See Littorina.

d oblique perspective; when parallel to that face, parallel perspective. -- Perspective shell (Zoöl.), any shell of the genus Solarium and allied genera. See Solarium.

bition. It was similar to the ostracism in Athens; but olive leaves were used instead of shells for ballots.

A kind of shell marble occurring in the Wealden clay at Petworth, in Sussex, England; -- called also Sussex marble.