Objects of Interest on the Sea Shore. 127 



them ; and there was no reason why they should not be good food. 

 They were not by any means the scavengers which our fresh water 

 eels were. They liked to kill their food, but failing this, it must 

 at least be fresh. They lived principally on fish. In the Solway 

 they got herrings, mackerel, mullet, flounders, salmon smolts, 

 and various kinds of fry. He had taken between forty and fifty 

 fish from the stomach of a 6-lb. conger. They were most 

 voracious feeders. The most remarkable thing about the conger 

 was the strength of its tail, by means of which it was able to 

 firmly grip any rock, stone, or other object, while with the rest of 

 its bodv it was free to feed, fight, or defend itself. Men had 

 been gripped by a conger, had an arm or leg drawn as far as it 

 would go into the brute's home under the rock, and been held 

 there till the rising tide had put an end to their misery. Men 

 had been killed by infuriated congers which had been hauled into 

 boats, and after they had done their work, usually throttling 

 owing to the line becoming entangled round the fisherman's neck, 

 they left the boat with its ghastly evidence of their visit. 



The large stones near low-water mark were well worth 

 attention, for under them a number of creatures hid. With a 

 little practice one was soon able to spot the likely stones. These 

 were usually resting on smaller stones or tilted against a rock 

 where the wash of the sea made a small pool underneath. When 

 turned over there was usually a general scuttling away of crabs, 

 but if there should be a conger coiled up he invariably had the 

 place to himself. Few living creatures cared to rest within sight 

 of his wicked eyes. Of crabs there were many kinds and colours. 

 Green crabs predominated, but there were brown, black, and red 

 crabs. Perhaps the first thing which struck one, after having 

 witnessed their surprising agility, was the clever way in which 

 they could scuttle into a corner and look like a stone. Unless 

 you had your eye on one before he folded his legs and subsided 

 into a crevice, you would probably never notice him at all. Even 

 the red crabs managed to become unnoticeable, except to a 

 practised eye. In half-an-hour one might gather a bucket- 

 ful of edible crabs with bodies as large as the palm 

 of one's hand in certain places. For some time after 

 casting the shell the crab was absolutely helpless. It 

 was, therefore, necessarv that the casting of the shell 



