A HISTORY OF NORFOLK 



The following remarks by the inspector himself, besides specifying the 

 crab intended, give some useful information in regard to its habitat : 



' The crab and lobster fisheries of Norfolk, I ascertain, have their 

 headquarters at Cromer, Sherringham, Runton, Weybourne, and the 

 adjoining villages situated along the coast along the extreme north of the 

 county of Norfolk. The crab pots are set out to sea from the foreshore 

 to the distance of about two miles. The extent of the united Cromer 

 and Sherringham fisheries is about eight and a quarter miles long by two 

 wide. The bottom of this district consists of large flints, with a large 

 portion of marl, in which are found occasional large rocks from one 

 hundredweight to four hundredweight each. 



' The sea bottom is very irregular, so that a trawl net cannot be 

 used. The whole of this sixteen square miles is a vast forest of seaweed, 

 and is naturally a splendid breeding and feeding place for crabs. My 

 observations in these pages are entirely confined to the edible crab [Cancer 

 pagurus), and do not include the green crabs (locally called Kittawiches), 

 or other kinds of crabs. 



' After a limit of two miles from the shore, the weeds and rocks 

 begin to gradually disappear, and the ground begins to be what is called 

 " spotty," i.e. rock alternating with smooth ground. The crabs are 

 scarce in this spotty ground.' ' 



Amid the disputes of philosophers as to whether two and two 

 always make four, or may occasionally make five, it is of interest to learn 

 that in the Cromer district six score cast of crabs are called a hundred, 

 and, as two crabs go to a cast, two hundred and forty in all will go to 

 the ' hundred.' At this rate it is not twice two, but twice six, that 

 make five. 



The only species which Buckland mentions by its scientific name is 

 Cancer pagurus (Linn.). In England scarcely any other species now 

 comes into the market, so that to many persons a crab means this species 

 and this alone. But in other parts of the world, where this is unknown 

 or unprocurable, there are many different species equally or more appre- 

 ciated for human food. Our own favourite belongs to the Cyclometopa, 

 that is, to the arch-fronted tribe of the Brachyura. So also do the green 

 crabs or kittawiches, if we may assume that by those names are intended 

 the common shore crab, Carcinus manas (Linn,). In the German report 

 above referred to four other crabs of this tribe are recorded from the 

 coast of Norfolk. Two of these, Pilumnus hirtellus (Linn.), the bristly 

 crab, and Pirimela denticulata (Montagu), which Adam White calls 'the 

 toothed Pirimela,' were taken by the Pommerania off the coast of Norfolk, 

 at a depth of twelve fathoms, on sand.' The bristly Pilumnus is not 

 uncommon. It belongs to a genus including an immense number of 

 hairy-coated small species, which are widely distributed over the seas of 

 the world. It has the tail part seven-jointed in both sexes. The still 

 smaller Pirimela is comparatively rare, but nevertheless to be met with on 

 many of the coasts of Great Britain and Ireland. Its colour is variable, 



* Report, p. 50. * Nordseefahrt der Pommerania, p. 291. 



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