THE SCHOOL OF THE SHORE 13 



ger of hard-and-fast statements by the fact 

 that there is a frog at Manilla which is often 

 seen hopping about on the shore. 



FISHES. The shore-fishes are legion, but 

 some are more characteristic than others. One 

 of these is the Gunnel or Butterfish (Gentro- 

 notus gunnellus), so extraordinarily difficult 

 to catch because of its power of insinuating 

 itself between the stones and into crevices, so 

 extraordinarily difficult to hold when one has 

 caught it, such is its slipperiness. The father- 

 lasher and the sand-eel, the cock-paidle and 

 the stickleback are also common on the shore. 



SEA-SQUIRTS. Fastened to the long flag-like 

 seaweeds there are often groups of Ascidians 

 or Sea-Squirts, strange degenerate creatures 

 which cross the frontier into the backboned 

 sub-kingdom in their free-swimming youth, 

 but sink back again, as it were, when they 

 grow up and settle down. On the stones at low 

 tide there are often very beautiful colonies 

 of compound Ascidians or Tunicates, quite 

 jewel-like sometimes in their fine colouring. 



MOLLUSCS. Highest in a way among back- 

 boneless or Invertebrate animals are the Mol- 



