CRANE FLY CRASSATELLA. 



165 



depends on the possession of a suitable site to grow 

 the cranberry. A piece of turfy bog-, by the side of 

 a pond, is the natural situation ; or an artificial 

 border of bog-earth may be formed, on which there 

 may be no fear of the plant succeeding. This latter 

 project, however, can only be justitied by comparing 

 the cost of home-growth with that charged by the 

 retailers of the fruit in this country. 



CRANE FLY, one of the names by which the 

 larger species of the dipterous insects belonging to 

 the family Tipitliclat are generally termed ; they are 

 also called daddy long legs, tailors, &c. They are 

 very abundant in pastures, especially at certain sea- 

 sons of the year, as at the end of the summer, when 

 they rise in swarms on being approached. Their long 

 le<rs are of great service to them in enabling them to 

 make their way through the long grass, but these limbs 

 are so slightly attached to the body, that they fall off 

 at the least touch, and the insect flies off, leaving them 

 in the hand when seized, with as little apparent care as 

 though nothing had occurred. Now if this violent 

 deprivation of the limbs were to happen in the higher 

 animals, what would be the result ? Is it not certain 

 that death would be the result ? And is it not equally 

 clear, that as this does not occur with the insect, that 

 the general construction of the two sets of animals is 

 so. completely distinct, that it is impossible for us to 

 judge with precision as to their feelings or senses, 

 which, in all probability, (may we not rather say, 

 absolutely necessarily,) are quite distinct from our 

 own ? 



The long legs of these insects are likewise very 

 useful to them at the period of depositing their eggs, 

 at which time the body is carried in a perpendicular 

 position, supported by the legs ; the abdomen is 

 terminated by an acute point formed of two horny 

 spines, between which the eggs are protruded. This 

 ovipositor is thrust by the insect into the earth, in 

 which the eggs are placed, and as each female lays 

 several hundred eggs, it is curious to see it when 

 engaged in this operation, raising its body up and 

 down, laving an egg each time its tail touches the 

 ground. In this manner it proceeds for a considerable 

 space without ever assuming an horizontal position. 

 The larva; hatched from these eggs are fleshy grubs 

 without less, having the mouth furnished with two jaws, 

 and several other organs, and the tail armed with several 

 spines. These larvae are very injurious byattacking the 

 roots of the herbage, amongst which they have been 

 hatched, and causing the plants to die. And as the 

 eggs are placed so close together, it is not surprising 

 that the larvte are exceedingly numerous, when this 

 is the case, the whole surface of the ground is of 

 course entirely stripped. When these larvae have 

 attained their full size, they are transformed into 

 quiescent pupie, which, previous to assuming the 

 perfect state, perform the same manoeuvre of pushing 

 part of their bodies above the surface of the earth, just 

 as we have described the proceedings of the cossus, 

 the cause of which is the same in each case. 



CRANE'S BILL is the Geranium of most authors. 

 This well-known genus is found inhabiting the 

 northern parts of Asia and Europe, with a few 

 stragglers in North America and South Africa. 

 Nearly twenty species are found in Britain, the 

 principal part of which are herbaceous perennials. 

 Many are ornamental, but none are useful ; at least 

 their virtues are unknown. See GERANIUM. 



CRANGON (Fabricius). A genus of crustaceous 



animals, belonging to the order Dccapoda, section 

 Macroura, and family Palannonidce, having for its type 

 the common edible shrimp (Cancer Crangon, Linnaeus ; 

 Crangon viti'gftris, Fabricius). The two anterior legs 

 are terminated by a moveable claw ; the second pair 

 of legs are didactyle, slender, and rather longer than 

 the preceding ; the rostrum of the shell is short, and 

 the shell itself smooth ; the abdomen is rounded ; the 

 wrists not annulated, and the legs not provided with 

 a basal appendage. There are several species of this 

 genus, but the most common and best known is that 

 above mentioned, and which is found in great pro- 

 fusion swimming in shoals near the shores with great 

 agility upon their backs. Immense numbers of them 

 are eaten, especially by the inhabitants of the western 

 coasts of Europe. They are caught by means of a 

 large open net, held at the end of a long stick, by 

 women and boys, upon our sandy shores. They are 

 are also employed as a bait for several kinds of fish. 



CRANIA (Cuvier, Lamarck ; ANOMIA, Linnaeus). 

 Linnaeus included this in his genus Anomin, from 

 which Bruguiere first separated it, pointing out its 

 distinctive characters. The shell is inequivalve, 

 nearly round, and most generally affixed by its lower 

 or inferior valve. The three indentations, or holes, 

 which are on the internal surface of this valve, appear 

 only to penetrate it, in consequence of the violence 

 necessarily used to detach it from the substance to 

 which it affixes itself by the external surface. La- 

 marck, therefore, does not consider them to be the 

 apertures through which the animal protrudes certain 

 muscles, in the manner of the Anomia cjihippium, but 

 merely depressions or cavities in the lower valve of 

 the shell, while it remains closely adhering to any 

 marine body. These holes or cavities give the shell 

 the appearance of a human skull. In some respects 

 it seems allied to the Terebratukp, while the form of 

 it, and being affixed by the inferior valve, would indi- 

 cate an alliiince with the genus Orbicuhi. The writer 

 has seen this shell attached to the root of the red 

 coral, but very rarely with both the valves perfect. 

 In Sowerby's genera of shells, this genus is ably and 

 very minutely described. 



Another distinction between this genus and the 

 Orbicnla is, that the latter are only held in the fis- 

 sures of rocks, or slightly adhere to them by some 

 muscular fibres of the animal, while the Crania has the 

 whole of one valve in immediate contact with the 

 object to which it adheres. 



The animal is not sufficiently known to be accu- 

 rately described. The Crania personata is the only 

 species of this genus known : it is so named from its 

 resemblance to a mask. It is classed by De Blain- 

 ville in the third class Acephalophora, first order Pal- 

 tiohraiichiata. 



CRASSATELLA (Lamarck; MACTRA, Gmelin). 

 A great affinity exists between this genus of molluscs 

 and those of the Mactraand Lulraria, it having, like 

 them, the ligament of the valves internal, and attached 

 to the primary cavitits of each valve ; but when closed, 

 they fit exactly, and do not gape as in those genera. 

 In some species the ligament is partially visible on 

 the exterior, but less so than in the genus Amphidcsma. 

 The shells of this genus are generally thick and very 

 ponderous whence the name ; they are striated lon- 

 gitudinally, denticulated, regular, subtrigonal, equi- 

 valve, inequilateral, the summits clearly defined, and 

 evidently curved forward, the lunule and corselet very 

 distinct ; hinge very large, sub-similar, formed by two 



