108 NATURE NOTES. 
with the weed, but which showed no signs of injury. In 
contrast to these living hermits, there were a few dead or 
moribund full-grown specimens inhabiting Fwsus shells, 
which must have come from deep water, and had succumbed 
to the battering to which they had been subjected. In the 
shell of one of these I found two specimens of the worm 
Nereis fucata, also dead. Apart from these hermits, the 
larger Crustacea were not very conspicuous, though near 
Longniddry I found one specimen of Portumnus variegatus, 
which does not appear to be very abundant in the Forth. 
Other interesting finds were several specimens of the 
anemone Jolocera, near Granton, which is specially interest- 
ing, because it grows at a depth (30—50 fathoms) believed 
by many authorities to be beyond the limit of violent wave- 
action, and some very fine specimens of Aphrodite aculeata, 
reaching a length of close upon six inches. As usual after 
a storm, large masses of the ascidian Ascidiella virginea 
occurred everywhere on the beach. The individuals grow 
in dense clusters attached to stones or to the polyzoan 
Gemellaria loricata, and the constant elimination by storms 
must be very heavy. At most periods of the year these 
clusters are to be found strewn on the shore. 
Generally, one may say that the effect of violent storms 
on the littoral invertebrates depends greatly upon the habit 
of the particular animal. Attached animals, like sponges, 
sea-anemones, ascidians, Aleyoniwm, etc., are saved by their 
sedentary habit from wave-action, unless this is very violent, 
but when once torn off their destruction is inevitable. In 
the case of slow-moving or burrowing animals lke many 
Mollusca, the danger of wave-action appears to be less the 
mere removal from the natural habitat, than the exposure to 
organic foes—most of the molluscs named above seemed to 
have received relatively little injury, but fell victims to the 
birds before they could attempt to return to their natural 
habitat. Soft-bodied animals, like the annelids, molluses 
without shells, and fish, seem to be actually beaten to death 
by the waves, a fate from which the borrowed shells of the 
hermits and the coats of the crabs and their allies do not 
always save them. It is no doubt this danger which has 
foreed so many shore animals to acquire heavy armour, 
