424 Pliny's natural history. [Eook IX. 



manner of snakes, throw off old age, and renew their coverings. 

 While other animals swim on the water, cray-fish float with a 

 kind of action like creeping. They move onwards, if there is 

 nothing to alarm ^^ them, in a straight line, extending on each 

 side their horns, which are rounded at the point by a ball 

 peculiar to them ; but, on the other hand, the moment they 

 are alarmed, they straighten these horns, and proceed with 

 a sidelong motion. They also use^* these horns when fight- 

 ing with each other. The cray-fish is the only animal that 

 has the flesh in a pulpy state, and not firm and solid, unless 

 it is cooked alive in boiling water. 



(.31.) The cray-fish frequents rocky places, the crab ^^ spots 

 which present a soft surface. In winter they both choose 

 such parts of the shore as are exposed to the heat of the sun, 

 and in summer they withdraw to the shady recesses of deep 

 inlets of the sea. All fish of this kind sufi'er from the cold of 

 winter, but become fat during autumn and spring, and more 

 particularly during the full moon ; for the warmth of that lumi- 

 nary, as it shines in the night, renders*^ the temperature of the 

 weather more moderate. 



CHAP. 51. THE VAEIOIJS KINDS OF CRABS ; THE PINNOTHERES, 



THE SEA URCHIN, COCKLES, AND SCALLOPS. 



There are various kinds of crabs," known as carabi,^ astaci,^^ 



"3 Aristotle, Hist. Anim. B. viii. c. 4, states to a similar effect. 



^^ Aristotle, loc. cit., and ^lian, Hist. Anim. B. ix. c. 25, state to the 

 same effect. 



""'^ Hardouin says, that this must he only understood of the kind of crab 

 known as the " astacus ;" that heing the one mentioned by Aristotle, in 

 the passage from which Pliny has borrowed. 



''^ He mentions, in B. ii. c. 41, the effect which the rays of the moon 

 have upon the growth of shell-fish. 



67 Aristotle, Hist. Anim. B. iv. c. 2, has a somewhat similar passage. 

 " The kinds of crabs are numerous, and not easily to be enumerated. 

 First, there are those known as maiae, then the paguri, which are also 

 called ' heracleotici ;' and, after them, the river crabs. There are others, 

 again, of a smaller size, and which, for the most part, are known by no 

 name in particular." 



^8 This is, no doubt, the cray-fish, the same animal that has been called 

 the "locusta" in the preceding Chapter. Aristotle states, B. iv. c. 8, that 

 tlie carabus has the thorax rough and spiny. It is most probable, that it 

 is from this name that our word " crab " is derived. 



*9 Cuvier says, that the astacus, wliich is very accurately described by 



