STAR-FISH. 301 



species, for it sometimes reaches a diameter of more 

 than a foot, with the rays nearly two inches wide. It 

 has a somewhat coarse appearance, for though the 

 colours are often gay, red, orange, yellow, or purple 

 above, and pale straw-yellow or cream-white beneath, 

 yet the surface is usually blotched in a scaly or 

 leprous manner, and the semi-crustaceous texture of 

 the skin, something between leather and shell, effec- 

 tually precludes the idea of personal beauty. Still it 

 is a very curious subject ; and as I mark it gliding 

 smoothly, and with a moderate rapidity, over the un- 

 evenness of the rocky bottom, and notice the me- 

 chanism by which its progression is effected, I see at 

 once that I have before me one of the great types of 

 animal locomotion ; a series of contrivances, by which 

 a given end, that of voluntary change of place, is 

 accomplished, which are quite sui generis ; admir- 

 able in their adaptation to the prescribed end, but 

 totally unlike the arrangements by which the same 

 object is attained in higher forms of life. 



This is worth studying in detail. Here we have 

 one of the multitudinous results of infinite Wisdom 

 and almighty Power combined in creation. The 

 problem is to endow with the faculty of voluntary 

 locomotion a sentient creature which has no internal 

 skeleton, and no limbs. It is solved in many ways 

 in the invertebrate classes, and this is one example. 



Each of the five thick and bluntly-pointed arms, 

 or rays, of this star-like animal is seen to be indented 

 on its under side by a rather wide and deep furrow, 



