170 GENUS PAGURUS. 



feasts upon the young fruit, the species of the present genus 

 clothes its soft and defenceless body in the cast-off cover- 

 ing of the shelled mollusks, occupying the turbinated shells 

 of numerous species of gasteropoda, to which they close- 

 ly attach themselves by means of the hooked appendages 

 of the abdomen. From this peculiarity they have been 

 commonly termed Hermit Crabs. Of this genus there have 

 until lately been only two correctly distinguished species 

 known as indigenous to this country ; but the examination 

 by Mr. William Thompson of numerous minute paguri, 

 occupying various small shells found on the coast of Ire- 

 land, has led to the clear discrimination of four additional 

 species; which, with one from the coast of Devonshire, 

 make altogether no less than seven British species. 



