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82 THE MARINE+ AQUARIUM. 
navies, that have found a common sepulchre in the waters, 
had given up their myriad souls to the conjuration of 
Glacus and Scylla, and all the dizzy troop of ocean spirits. 
It is, verily, a wondrous creature, of enormous size, and 
so delicately tinted, so light and fairy-like in structure, 
so constantly expanding and retracting its thousand deli- 
cate fingers, like the Indian blossom that the Brahmin 
| believes to be endowed with life, that it never ceases to 
attract the attention of the coldest, and fill the ardent 
lover of nature with— 
“ the amaze 
Of deep-seen wonders.” 
I have before me now five specimens of this splendid 
anemone. They are all expanded, and they glow im the 
sunshine like huge carnations of the brightest amber, 
one of them verging towards a pure white. Two of these 
are represented in the engraving, surrounded by fronds 
of Delesseria sanguinea, Callithamnium, and Griffithsia. 
The one attached to the perpendicular side of a stone 
is of the golden amber variety ; when fully expanded it 
forms a massive column of five inches in height, at least, 
and nearly three in diameter. From the summit of the 
column the tentacles fringe over in rich masses, like the 
petals of a monster carnation, all of them in motion as 
if seeking something which they cannot find. ‘The ten- 
tacular disk is deeply frilled and puckered, and constantly 
changes its outline under the capricious will of the animal ; 
while, at the same time, the tentacles arrange and re- 
arrange themselves into most confusing forms ; then again 
expand to their utmost, and expose the oval mouth and 
