122 I N A G U A 



possible to tease out small pieces of brown matter which proved 

 on more thorough examination to be the life substance of 

 sponges. Like the urchins, these sponges drilled into the rock 

 with acid. Some of the holes were as neatly formed as if shaped 

 with an auger bit. 



The last word in hole drilling, though, came to light when 

 I took a piece of rock containing a number of these cave- 

 dwelling sponges up to the house and examined their structure 

 under the microscope. Inside the sponge, which itself was not 

 more than a quarter of an inch in total diameter, was the fairy- 

 like form of the young of some indeterminate crustacean. The 

 early stages of so many of the crustaceans are so totally unlike 

 the adults that I found it impossible to discover its identity; its 

 structure was long and angular, and apparently it spent its 

 earlier stages ensconced in the interstices of the sponge, gather- 

 ing substance and strength before venturing out into the violent 

 and dangerous world of the surf. I would have given much to 

 have been able to visualize its life history, to have seen the 

 hour when it burst from its egg case, to have known how it 

 swam its way into its darksome abode in the entrails of a boring 

 sponge. 



Where certain of the surf -residents survived by making stick- 

 ing plasters of themselves like the chitons, holding so tightly 

 to the rock that they could be moved only with a heavy screw- 

 driver, and where others hid in holes or crevices lil^e the boring 

 sponges, or dashed rapidly about like the Grapsus crabs, or like 

 the snails and gastropods crouched in thick houses of shell, the 

 anemones resisted the elements by virtue of their sheer versa- 

 tility. There were several species scattered over the rocks; the 

 most numerous were the large pink variety similar to the ones 

 which I found in the pool, and which I moved to one side to 

 prevent their being crushed, and a delicate brown species which 



