330 On some Rarities found on the West Coast of Scotland. 



glass by tlie short papillee with which its body was covered. Its 

 colour was dirty white clouded with reddish brown. Next day 

 it was blown up again^ had become more lively, and twisted itself 

 into various forms. It gave us no reason to think that it had a 

 proboscis. It only once displayed its tentacula, about twelve in 

 number, which were spread back and lay quite Hat around the 

 mouth in the form of a little star. While we waited for a more 

 complete manifestation, it died in our hands, so that the figure 

 was taken by my daughter Margaret in very unfavourable cir- 

 cumstances*. The tentacula were broader at the base than they 

 are represented in the figure. When it put out only the tips of 

 them, they appeared round, obtuse, and marked with reddish 

 brown bands, somewhat like the single magnified tentaculum in 

 the figure. When it died it shrunk into very small dimensions. 

 The concentric corrugations, though still fainter than the ribs, 

 were more evident than when it was alive. The reticulations as- 

 sumed a beaded aspect, so as to give the body of the creature, in 

 certain lights, a considerable resemblance to a small head of 

 Indian corn. 



But let me not forget to mention among the memorabilia, a 

 Champagne bottle fished up last summer from the deep sea be- 

 twixt Bute and Cumbrae ! A bottle of Highland whisky could not 

 have been more prized by my friend James M^Fee the fisherman, 

 nor a bottle of old Falernian more valued by myself. It seemed 

 quite a knowing, far-travelled, aristocratic bottle. Instead of a 

 cork, it 



" Had fix'd a scallop on its mouth before." 



Its sides were incrusted with Serpula triquetra, and its deep 

 concavity below was inwrought with Serpula tuhularia. But what 

 did it contain ? Ay, there ^s the rub. It w^ould take a wise man 

 to answer that question. I never attempted it. It was full, how- 

 ever, of some white, soft, dense substance. Having by dint of 

 assiduity extracted a little of it, I sent it by post to Dr. Sten- 

 house, a first-rate chemist in Glasgow, begging him to let me 

 know what treasure of the deep this marine vial contained. Ha- 

 ving done it all the honours of his laboratory, and having se- 

 cundum artem analysed the precious contents, he returned for 

 answer that ^' it was fat of some kind — probably tallow '' \\\ 

 " Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus." 



Asterina gibhosa. 



In August 1844 I had the pleasure of finding Asterina gib- 

 bosa, or the gibbous starlet, in pools of sea-water on the rocky 

 shore of Arran, near to Lamlash. It has been found in several 



* In consequence of this, the drawing has not been engraved. 



