CRABS AKD SHRIMPS. 



207 



quired a siifticicnt maturity to swim about and get their 

 independent living. 



This receptacle — in M-liicli you may sec five or &ix 

 eggs — is freely open to the surrounding water, which 

 enters the slit edge of the shell, behind the tail. Per- 

 haps you wonder why the eggs are not washed out by 

 the respiratory currents ; they are in fact maintained in 



DAPnSIA. 



their position only by a slender tongue-like projection 

 from the back of the parent, which appears to have that 

 special object. When, however, the young arc ready 

 for freedom, the mother has but to depress her body a 

 little more than ordinary, when the door is opened, and 

 the young easily slip from the receptacle into the open 

 water. 



These tiny odd-looking sprawling things that you 

 see moving about by quick jerks in the same drop of 

 water, are the young recently hatched. They arc quite 

 unlike their parent, having as yet no bivalve shell, no 

 abdomen, and only three pairs of limbs. The body is a 



