THE ARROW MUZZLET. 
237 
The heavy easterly gales of last autumn, coinciding with 
the October spring tides, must have disturbed the Peachice 
iu their burrows ; for the species suddenly became common, 
as many as fifty having found their way into the possession 
of the Torquay dealers about that time. A few of these 
fell to my lot, and enabled me to correct and amplify the 
history of the species. 
These specimens were very lively, ever bending their 
columns, and rapidly changing their forms. While under 
examination, they frequently adhered by various points of 
the column, and when lying on the side would, gradually 
but quickly, bring the hinder extremity round, under the 
body, nearly to the front, and then applying it to the bottom 
of the vessel, adhere, not by the orifice, but by the swollen 
sm-face around it. Constrictions were constantly passing 
along, commencing about the middle of the column, and 
passing off down'svards, the effect of which was to throw 
out the translucent posterior extremity, like a clear dis- 
tended bladder, within which the septa could be very 
distinctly defined. 
One only of the specimens survived, the others I dis- 
sected. Tlie former I put into a vase of sea-water with 
a bottom of sand. This was at night ; in the morning it 
was just beginning to insert the hinder extremity into the 
sand, and thence the process of burrowing w'ent on regu- 
larly. In two hours it elevated the fore parts, and assumed 
a perpendicular position, continuing to descend.* By 
* Mr. Holdsworth, who obtained another of the Torquay specimens, has 
made an interesting observation on this process. " After it had selected a 
suitable place for burrowing, in the darkest part of the vase, the posterior 
extremity of the body became tapered to a fine point by a partial expulsion 
of the contained water, and at the same time turned downwards and 
pressed slightly into the ground ; the fluid contents of the animal were 
then forced back until the base was completely distended, and by thi.s 
means a shallow depression in the sand produced ; the tail then resumed 
its conical shape, was again thrust into the ground, and swelled out ; and 
these proceedings were continued until a hole was made sufficiently large 
to admit the animal. Its first efibrts in burrowing had but little effect. 
