82 GLAUCUS; OR, 
its gaunt grotesque body to and fro, while it makes 
mesmeric passes with its large fore claws,—one of 
the most ridiculous of Nature’s many ridiculous forms. 
Those which you will find will be some quarter of 
an inch in length; but in the cold area of the North 
Atlantic, their cousins, it is now found, are nearly 
three inches long, and perch in like manner, not on 
sea-weeds, for there are none so deep, but on branch- 
ing sponges. | 
These are but two instances out of many of 
forms which were supposed to be peculiar to 
shallow shores repeating themselves at vast depths: 
thus forcing on us strange questions about changes 
in the distribution and depth of the ancient seas; 
and forcing us, also, to reconsider the old rules by 
which rocks were distinguished as deep-sea or 
shallow-sea deposits according to the fossils found 
in them. 
As for the new forms, and even more important 
than them, the ancient forms, supposed to have 
been long extinct, and only known as fossils, till 
they were lately rediscovered alive in the nether 
