NATURAL HISTORY STUDIES 



especially) on extraordinary lank legs, over twenty 

 times the length of the body. They hunt mostly 

 by night, killing and sucking small insects and 

 drinking drops of dew. If we catch one by the leg 

 it surrenders it instantaneously and stalks away. 

 The same sort of profitable surrender is exhibited 

 by some spiders and by some insects, such as grass- 

 hoppers, crickets, and their relatives. 



The surrender of limbs is very common among 

 crabs and other Crustaceans. When the limb is 

 seized or when it is damaged by the fall of a stone 

 what does the crab do but break it off near the base ? 

 There is a particular line of weakness the breakage 

 plane ; the surrender is brought about by the very 

 forcible contraction of the muscles at the base of 

 the limb ; and the snap is over before we have time 

 to say " a limb for a life." Neatest of all is an 

 arrangement inside the base of the leg, just below 

 the breaking-line, whereby a bandaging membrane 

 with two flaps closes up the wound and prevents 

 bleeding. This is wonderful surgery, to cut and to 

 bind at the same moment. We are reminded of the 

 partition which in autumn grows across the place 

 where the leaf -stalk joins the branch, and closes up 

 the wound as it separates off the withering and dying 

 leaf. Inside the crab's bandaging membrane a 

 new leg is formed in miniature, and after a time 

 when the crab moults its husk this new leg shoots out 

 like a Jack-in-the-box, and soon hardens. 



So we see that among many different kinds of 

 animals the device has been established of surrender- 

 ing a limb and saving a life. In some way or other 



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