THE STAR-FISHES. 155 
clarifying and making the waters of the ocean salubrious for its 
world of inhabitants is carried on silently, quietly, but continuously. 
How wondrous are the arrangements by which the Creator com- 
pletes the compensations of life! 
Ehrenberg first discovered that the star-fish had eyes. They 
are placed at the very end of the arms, and on the under surface ; 
they are bright red globules, surrounded by a defence of spiny 
cilia. To use them the animal is obliged to raise up the arm. 
These eyes, in one sense, may be said to be very imperfect, for 
they possess no lens; at least, the most careful observers have not 
as yet discovered any. 
Edward Forbes gives a most interesting account of a star-fish 
which is found in the Mediterranean—the Luidia ciliaris—which, 
when attacked, is able to destroy itself; first the arms break off 
one after the other, and then the disc breaks itself into pieces. 
Not being able to defend itself as a whole, it kills itself in 
detail. One which had thus escaped him by sacrificing its arms, 
opened and shut its spinous eyelid with something very like a 
wink ! 
The star-fishes propagate their species by eggs, which are 
produced in vast numbers ; the mother carries them in a cavity 
formed by a curvature of the body and the rays. They are so 
situated that the creature cannot use its mouth, and, consequently, 
it has to pass the period of gestation without taking any food. 
An asteria has been known to remain in this state for eleven 
days. The eggs are yellow or red. The young come out of the 
egg very unlike the parent; they have no rays, are ovoid in 
shape, and are provided with vibratory cils, which give them the 
appearance of infusoria. They swim with great activity. At the 
end of a certain time the rays bud out of the upper part of the 
body in the shape of four tiny arms, by means of which the little 
star-fish fixes itself to its mother. As yet the members are only 
temporary ; the body gradually flattens itself out and becomes a 
disc, at first round, upon the surface of which, towards the middle, 
spring up without any particular order, globular protuberances, 
which are the rudiments of the suckers; these appear to form six 
concentric rays. At last the body begins to become pentagoaal 
