220 SEASIDE DIYINITT. 



plexity of its structure. The various species of 

 star-fishes likewise differ widely from each other. 

 Thus, the star-fish and the urchin belong to the 

 same order ; but nothing can be more remarkable 

 than their external dissimilarity. 



The whole order has been subdivided by 

 naturalists into six families, some specimens of 

 which we shall suppose to fall under our readers' 

 observation. 



In the first of these six families are compre- 

 hended those fossils so well known to geologists 

 as Crinoidece, a term signifying likeness to a lily. 

 These animals were the inhabitants of the primaeval 

 seas. They consisted of a stalk, by which they 

 were attached, like other zoophytes, or like marine 

 plants, to a particular spot, on the extremity of 

 which stalk was the body of the animal, formed, 

 like the common star-fish, of arms or rays di- 

 verging from a centre. The jointed stalk by 

 which the lily-shaped body was supported con- 

 sisted, like the -back-bone of a fish, of a large 

 number of pieces perforated in the centre. These 

 pieces, separated from each other, may frequently 

 be picked up among the shingle on the beach. 

 In ancient times they were often formed into 

 rosaries by being strung upon a thread by means 

 of the perforation in the centre, and in the north 

 of England they are still known as St. Cuthbert's 

 beads, after the name of the venerable Abbot of 

 Lindisfarne. Sir Walter Scott thus refers to the 

 ancient tradition to which those parts of the 

 crinoidea owe their name : 



