78 Part second. 



state produce most brilliant colours over their body. The female lays 

 large, black, pear-shaped eg-g-s and fixes them singly to corals and algge, 

 usually close tog-ether , so that they form larg-e g-rape-like clusters 

 (often visible in tank Nr. 19). As soon as the young- are hatched they shew 

 their proficiency in chang'ing- their colouring and emitting:|fhe sepia. 



The Cuttlefish is an important article of commerce: its flesh is eaten, 

 the cuttle-bone is used for polishing- wood and as tooth-powder , and 

 the ink commands a high price. 



The Calmar or Squid (Loligo vulgaris. Fig. 15), very common in 

 winter, is unfortunately too delicate for the Aquarium. Like a swarm 

 of birds, slowly beating their fins, these transparent animals swim back- 

 wards and forwards, without turning- round, until they die; usually only 

 a few days after their capture. The slightest disturbance puts them in 

 a state of great alarm and causes their milk-white bodies to show the 

 most lovely red tints. They can be fed with small shrimps and will 

 be seen to use their long- arms like the cuttlefish. Their flesh is eaten 

 very generally; the « pen » — corresponding to cuttle-bone — is trans- 

 lucent, flexible and shaped like a feather. Like Sepia they secrete ink; 

 hence the Italian name of calamajo (ink-pot). 



It is certain that the Cephalopoda can attain enormous dimensions, 

 and from occasional specimens have probably arisen the legends of the 

 Kraken, if not of the sea-serpent. Thus Pliny relates a story of an 

 animal of this kind , which came at night to the fish-tanks of Carte ja , 

 and frightened the dogs away by its snorting- and its terrible arms. The 

 head which was shewn to Lucullus, was as larg-e as a barrel, and its 

 arms were so thick, that a man could scarcely clasp them and measured 

 30 feet in length. Montfort tells of an Octopus that tore a couple of sai- 

 lors from the rigging of a ship near St. Helena; the end of one of its 

 arms, which caught in the tackle, was hewn off and measured 25 feet. 

 On the coast of Newfoundland in 1875 an extraordinary number of such 

 gigantic animals were found either dead or dying- on the surface of the 

 sea. On the average they must each have weighed half a ton; their long- 

 arms reached a length of 40 feet. On the coasts of Alaska, Japan, New- 

 Zealand and on the Pacific island of St. Paul similar monsters have been 

 observed; a gigantic arm is in the British Museum. 



Like the Cephalopods, the Gastropods (Snails and Slugs) have a head 

 distinctly marked off from the body; it is devoid of arms, but there is 

 present a so-called foot, ^. e. a portion of the body is flattened out like 

 the sole of a foot and is used for crawling, which is generally the only 

 means of locomotion possessed by the Snails. In many kinds the viscera 

 are contained in a spirally coiled, calcareous shell, the snail-sliell, into 

 which the rest of the body can be retracted. The shell is secreted by 

 the mantle, a flap of the skin, and is held on the animal by means of 

 a spiral muscle. The foot frequently carries a horny or calcareous lid, 

 which closes the mouth of the shell when the bodv of the animal is 



