WE: 
SOME COASTWISE FISHES. 
Amone the odds and ends that the incoming 
flood casts upon the beach are the peculiar pillow- 
shaped objects with long-drawn-out corners which 
are generally known under the name of ‘sea- 
purses.’ Great is the discussion attending the 
finding of. one of these sea-purses, and many are 
the conjectures regarding their true nature. The 
specimens found on the sand are usually dry and 
split in the purse portion, showing nothing within ; 
‘SEA-PURSE.’ 
but when freshly drawn from the sea-weed to 
which they were at one time firmly attached, they 
contain each a solitary egg, or, if development has 
proceeded sufficiently far, an embryo in place 
of the egg. This embryo is the young of the 
skate or ray, that common representative of the 
shark tribe of fishes, whose broad fleshy masses, 
with a grinning mouth on the under surface, are 
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