82 OUR CARCINOLOGICAL FRIENDS. 
them you can frequently see the little animal 
peeping forth, preparatory to a sally. At another 
part of the flat, where the thud of your footsteps 
has not given advance signals of danger, hundreds 
of these merry crablings are probably busily occu- 
pied with their out-door labors. Approach them, 
and away they scamper to their habitations. There 
are both males and females in the throng, the for- 
FIDDLER (Gelasimus vocator) 
mer recognizable by the very undue development 
of one of the claws, which is carried transversely 
in front of the head. When provoked, the animal 
brandishes this claw in a somewhat threatening 
manner, which has been likened to the pulling 
of a violin-bow—hence the name of ‘ fiddler’—and 
by others to the action of beckoning or calling 
(hence ‘ calling crabs’). 
Taking the necessary precaution to hold the big 
