ANIMALS SENT BY POST. 85 



but a tin box it knew not, except by vague report. 

 Tenby has not even a banker ; to get a cheque changed 

 you must ride to Pembroke ; why, then, expect it will 

 have a tinman ? Imagine my impatience, my disgust ! 

 I'm afraid I used strong language. At last a brilliant 

 conception made my pathway clear. In a grocer's shop 

 there were cases of ginger-nuts for sale ; these cases 

 were of tin ; they were larger, much, than my require- 

 ments ; but this was no occasion for di^awing fine lines. 

 The nuts were edible, the case transportable. An in- 

 vestment was straightway made, and my agitated mind 

 was once more at peace. 



The case was large enough to contain, besides a 

 quantity of Anemones, a wide-mouthed bottle, in which 

 I had consigned a fine specimen of that boring bivalve 

 named Pholas dactylus (Plate II., fig. 3), three of 

 which had been brought to me in a lump of wood, 

 wherein they had bored themselves a local habitation. 

 Although these MoUuscs live in rocks and wood, they 

 seem to flourish perfectly when removed, and left in 

 sea water. I risked one in the exjDeriment, and was 

 imeasy, next morning, at finding he had elongated him- 

 self to more than half aoain his original size ; but ob- 

 serving the currents were still active from his siphon, 

 and that, on being touched, he shrunk to his original 

 size with gTeat sensitiveness, I concluded he was 

 healthy, — a conclusion supported by observing pre- 

 cisely the same phenomena exhibited by the two 

 Pholades still in the wood. As, therefore, the Pholas 

 lived out of his woody home, and as I had three speci- 



