BENEATH TROPIC SEAS 



and biting ability. Although a crab's sand burrow 

 is his castle, and the most savory morsel or the 

 charmingest fiddler wench can tempt him hardly 

 more than a yard or two away, yet his race is wide- 

 spread. Many times in past centuries his 

 ancestors must have clung fearfully but tenaciously 

 to floating trees and other oceanic jetsam, and 

 drifted far and wide, for his brethren are found 

 today from the Bahamas throughout the West 

 Indies, clear around the Gulf of Mexico and on 

 south as far as Rio. 



In the course of ten visits I observed a noticeable 

 increase in an acceptance of me as something not 

 wholly inimical. I should dearly love to identify 

 myself in the fiddlers' notions, as a swaying man- 

 grove for harmlessness. I believe I should find 

 more than the three basic problems. The court- 

 ship I think would prove to be more complex, and 

 actual uses more apparent and vital for the huge 

 claw, — twice as long and nearly half as heavy as all 

 the rest of its owner. 



66 



