12 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



do not like to touch them. This is not wonderful, for their 

 appearance is anything but prepossessing. . . . 



" It is extremely irritable, and on being touched or dis- 

 turbed, throws out a bunch of white tapered threads about an 

 inch in length, and one-eighth in thickness, . . . they stick 

 to everything they touch, and from these the animals are 

 called ' Cotton-Spinners ' by the fishermen. This small bunch 

 is drawn into a large mass of threads, so small that the finest 

 sewing-cotton is not equal to it, and is no doubt one of the 

 means of defence provided for its preservation ; for I have 

 seen a crab so completely entangled in it as not to be able 

 to move, and a fish only able to get away after a long 

 struggle." 



Prof. F. Jeffrey Bell notes that in the neighbourhood of 

 Falmouth, Cotton-Spinners are known to the fishermen as 

 " Sea-Cows." l 



THE ROYAL SCOTTISH MUSEUM, EDINBURGH. 



THE OCCURRENCE OF A RARE CRAB, PARO- 

 MOLA CUVIERI, IN SCOTTISH WATERS. 



By JAMES RITCHIE, M.A., B.Sc. 



FOR many years there has existed in the collection of 

 Crustaceans in the British Museum a fragmentary specimen, 

 a " detached carapace, six inches in length, and the two 

 chelipeds " of Paronwla cuvieri (Risso), regarding which an 

 accompanying portion of a letter tells that : " The crab shell 

 was found on the shore of Ensay, a farm on the west coast 

 of Mull, belonging to Lord Compton." Other than this 

 scrappy note nothing is known of the specimen, and its 

 occurrence remained unrecorded until Mr. J. N. Halbert 

 mentioned it in discussing the first appearance of P. cuvieri 

 in Irish waters. 1 Referring to the Mull specimen he says : 

 " Possibly this occurrence has been regarded as somewhat 



1 "Proc. Zool. Soc.," London, 1884, p. 563. 

 2 See J. N. Halbert, "Irish Naturalist," xvii. 1908, pp. 129-132. 



