CRABS. 127 



Stickleback was indeed the parent ; and the transition 

 from the infantile Blenny-like outline of the face, high, 

 bluff, and almost perpendicular, to the true Stickleback 

 outline, long, slender, pointed, with the far-projecting 

 lower jaw, is something remarkable. 



But now the tide has reached its lowest mark ; and 

 as we wander over the wet sand at its very verge, our 

 attention is attracted by every tiny object that breaks 

 the uniform level, even at a considerable distance. Some 

 of these are worm- casts thrown up by busy Annelids, 

 working away in the sand to reach a lower and there- 

 fore a wetter level, as the upper stratum dries in the 

 sun. But others are Crabs, of two or three species. One 

 of them is the somewhat uncommon and very beautiful 

 Portumnus variegatus, of which a great number are left 

 by the sea, but all of them dead ; some of them, how- 

 ever, from their freshness, only recently defunct. The 

 shape of the carapace, or body-shell, is very elegant, and 

 the colours, though sober a light drab, mottled and 

 pencilled with pale lilac are pleasing : the hindmost 

 pair of feet terminate in thin swimming- plates, but 

 they are narrow, and exhibit the natatory character in 

 only a subordinate degree. 



Other Crabs are alive and active, though, to be sure, 

 in a somewhat sluggish way. Here we catch sight of a 

 slight movement in the wet sand, and, stooping, we per- 



I 



