VARIOUS BEAUTIES. 25 



and wonders we discover. I have just detected an 

 Ascidian^ standing up like an amphora of crystal, 

 containing strange mne of yellow and scarlet ; and 

 crawling about the root of that Oar-weed, I see various 

 Annelids of great beauty ; we must have the root— the 

 more so that it bears some Botryllus clustering round 

 it. You want to know what is that jelly-like globule 

 no bigger than a pea ? I can't answer ; but probably 

 the ovum of some fish. At any rate, the rule is to 

 carry home whatever one does not know, and identify 

 there, if possible ; so pop the glc^ule into a phial. 

 Having made this haul, we may now begin to hammer 

 away for the Gem. There, he is all safe in the jar, and 

 we get down from our ledge much richer than we got 

 up. It was a good find that pool, was it not? We had 

 been upwards of an hour peering about, without finding 

 anything except a Crassicornis ; and lo ! we come upon 

 a little pool not two feet in length, which yields us 

 enough to occupy a month of careful study. 



The tide is fast flowing in, and our jars are still half 

 empty. We must waste no time in talk. Here, give 

 me the landing-net ; I see a fish worth having. Bravo ! 

 he is in the glass jar, and looking at us mth strange 

 human look, not in the least abashed by our admiration. 

 Did you ever see anything more exquisite ? It is a 

 ribbon-fish, but not the Gymnetrus Banksii. It can- 

 not be more than two inches and a half long, and a fifth 



* Plate I., Frontispiece, fig. 4, represents a compound Ascidian, 

 magnified ; the solitary Ascidian is less elongated, and is ordinarily of 

 about the size figured, but is sometimes found thrice the size. 



