LUNAR RHYTHM Ui 



determine the sequence of the movement of tlic Icfrs and, as 

 the following verse shows, it may be a matter of considerable 

 doubt to the millipede: 



A centipede was happy quite 



Until a toad in fun 



Said, "Pray which leg moves after which?" 



This raised her doubts to such a pitch, 



She fell exhausted in a ditch, 



Not knowing how to run. 



A very peculiar rhythm has recently been investigated in 

 a sea-urchin in the Red Sea. It has long been a tradition 

 that the moon exercises a peculiar effect on both plants and 

 animals; and apparently this has proved to be true as regards 

 certain marine invertebrates/ Aristotle tells us that the 

 ovaries of the sea-urchin acquire a greater size than usual 

 at the time of full moon. Cicero notes that oysters and other 

 shell-fish increase and decrease with the moon. Pliny makes 

 a similar observation, and the same belief is common to-day 

 in many of the Mediterranean fish-markets. A Neapolitan 

 fisherman will: 



Pitch down his basket before us, 



All trembling alive 

 With pink and grey jellies, your sea-fruit; 



You touch the strange lumps, 

 And mouths gape there, eyes open, all manner 



Of horns and of humps. 



Beowning, The Englishman in Italy. 



Edible molluscs, crabs, and sea-urchins — " frutti di mare " — arc 

 stated to vary with the phases of the moon. When the moon is 

 full the animal is said to be "full." When the moon is new the 

 animal is "empty." Quite recent observation has shown that at 

 any rate in the sea-urchin known as Diadema sdosa, a very 

 large form, a foot or more in diameter, found at Suez, the testes 

 and the ovaries, which are the edible parts of sea-urchins, 

 show a rhythmic growth and decline corresponding with the 

 lunar cycle. At full moon these generative organs arc at their 

 largest, and then spawning takes place. After this the testes 

 and ovaries grow smaller, and after the new moon they begin 

 to increase again in size in preparation for a fmiher season of 

 spawning. The sea-urchins of the Mediterranean do not show 



