iio Dwellers of the Sea and Shore 



existence, he will have molted once more and attained 

 a quarter of an inch in length. The following summer 

 will find him considerably larger, and by the third 

 year he will have arrived at the period of sexual 

 maturity; whereupon he will begin to take notice of 

 his fellows, both males and females. From this time 

 onward his feastings, fastings, fightings, and love- 

 makings will continue. About two years later, realiz- 

 ing that the business of life is done, he will crawl under 

 the shelter of a rock or frond of seaweed and die. 



It is a natural impulse for us sentimental humans, 

 when contemplating these lowly creatures whose em- 

 ployments have excited our interest, to exaggerate, 

 somewhat, their mental capacities. Intimate knowl- 

 edge of their ways, however, reveals the disappointing 

 proof of a cerebration almost incredibly restricted in 

 its range. But, regardless of the measure we may give 

 to their intelligence, it is likewise a common experience 

 at times to wonder what thoughts — if such an attribute 

 can be said to distinguish invertebrate animals — are 

 passing through some spineless brute's brain. We wish 

 to be transformed by some magic power for a brief 

 period, and to be reduced to the same mental plane In 

 order to glean a glimpse of that strange psychology of 

 another world, a world so mysterious that a moment's 

 consideration leads us at once to recognize that here 

 we have to deal with factors which have barely any- 

 thing in common with human understanding — which is 

 to say, the behavior of the invertebrate is governed by 

 Impulses that have little resemblance to intellectual fac- 

 ulties as we understand our own. 



In truth, a thoughtful consideration of all lower- 



