SEASIDE LODGINGS 83 



eggs. These are cast up by the waves upon the sand, and 

 in due course out creep the young crabs, which then cling 

 to the rocks in thousands, but presently quit the water for 

 any suitable places of protection on land, there acquiring 

 strength to follow their mothers up the country. : 



Patrick Browne says : i The eggs are discharged from the 

 body through two small round holes situated at the sides, 

 and about the middle of the under shell ; these are only 

 large enough to admit one at a time, and, as they pass, they 

 are entangled in the branched capillaments, with which the 

 outer side of the apron is copiously supplied, to which they 

 stick by means of their proper gluten, until the creatures 

 reach the surf, where they wash 'em all off, and then they 

 begin to return back again to the mountains. It is re- 

 markable that the bag or stomach of this creature changes 

 its juices with the state of the body; and, while poor, is 

 full of a black, bitter, disagreeable fluid , which diminishes 

 as it fattens, and, at length, acquires a delicate rich 

 flavour. About the month of July or August the crabs 

 fatten again, and prepare for mouldering, filling up their 

 burrow with dry grass, leaves, and abundance of other 

 materials ; when the proper period comes, each retires to 

 his hole, shuts up the passage, and remains quite inactive, 

 until he gets rid of his old shell, and is fully provided with 

 a new one. How long they continue in this state is un- 

 certain, but the shell is first observed to burst both at the 

 back and sides, to give a passage to the body, and it ex- 

 tracts its limbs from all the other parts gradually after- 

 ward. At this time the fish is in the richest state, and 

 covered only by a tender membranous skin variegated with 

 a multitude of reddish veins, but this hardens gradually 

 after, and becomes soon a perfect shell like the former ; it 

 is, however, remarkable that during this change there are 

 some stony concretions always found in the bag, which 

 waste and dissolve gradually, as the creature forms and 

 perfects its new crust. A wonderful mechanism ! ' A 

 footnote remarks that the concretions, which are the well- 

 known gastroliths or crab's eyes, ' are seldom under two or 

 more than four.' 



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