9 



If a specimen of the insect be examined with a hand 

 lens, it will be seen to be covered with a coatinf>' of whitish 

 hairs. When the animal is submerg-ed under water, a 

 sufficient supply of air is retained by this hairy coating to 

 enable respiration to go on freely for a considerable 

 period, and at the same time it renders the insect 

 incapable of being wetted. In order to test the truth of 

 this, it is only necessary to take a few specimens and place 

 them in a deep glass vessel together with some sea-water. 

 If the vessel be shaken sufficiently, the animals will 

 become submerged below the surface of the water, and 

 each individual will then be seen to be enveloped in a 

 glistening coat of air. When once they are submerged 

 they are unable to reach the surface again, and they 

 crawl aimlessly about the bottom of the vessel. The 

 animals thus treated remained active for four and a half 

 days whenever the vessel was slightly shaken. On the 

 hfth day they had used up all the air investing them, and 

 on the sixth day scarcely anj^ movement was noticeable 

 among them, and they appeared to be in an asphyxiated 

 condition. On the seventh day they seemed to all 

 purposes to be quite dead. 



In sandy localities Anurida resorts to burrowing for 

 protection from the incoming tide. In the neighbourhood 

 of Rhyl, jN'orth Wales, it occurs plentifully at low water 

 about the sands and on the surface of the pools left by 

 the retreating tide among the depressions and inequalities 

 in the shore. Since there are no rocks or other means of 

 shelter at hand, the insect has to bury itself in the wet 

 sand as the tide rises and to remain there until the next 

 ebb. It also appears to live under somewhat similar 

 conditions at Treport in Xormandy, for in that locality it 

 is mentioned as frequenting the mud at the mouth of a 

 rivulet. About the sandy beach on the north side of 



