274 



ARACHNIDA XIPHOSURA 



CHAP. 



water. I have not been able to watch the process more closely 

 because the animals lie so close to the sand, and all the append- 

 ages are concealed beneath the carapace. If touched during the 



oviposition, they cease the operation and 

 wander to another spot or separate and re- 

 turn to deep water. I have never seen the 

 couples come entirely out of the water, 

 although they frequently come so close to 

 the shore that portions of the carapace are 

 uncovered." 



The developing ova and young larvae are 

 very hardy, and in a little sea-water, or still 

 better packed in sea-weed, will survive long 

 journeys. In this way they have been 

 transported from the Atlantic to the Pacific 

 coasts of the United States, and for a time 

 at any rate flourished in the western waters. 

 Three barrels full of them consigned from 

 Woods Holl to Sir E. Eay Lankester arrived 

 in England with a large proportion of larvae 

 alive and apparently well. 



According to Kishinouye, L. longispina 

 spawns chiefly in August and between tide- 

 marks. ' The female excavates a hole about 



the female Limuius male fertilises them. The female afterwards 



TowardKioweS buries them > and begins to excavate the next 



the round "nests" hole." A line of nests (Fig. 157) is thus 



taking - e crab P teing established which is always at right angles 



apparently exhausted, to the shore-line. After a certain number 



(From Kishinouye.) c 



About natural size. ot nests have been formed the female tires, 

 and the heaped up sand is not so prominent. 

 In each " nest " there are about a thousand eggs, placed first to 

 the left side of the nest and then to the right, from which Kishi- 

 nouye concludes that the left ovary deposits its ova first and then 

 the right. Limuius rotundicauda and L. moluccamts do not bury 

 their eggs, but carry them about attached to their swinimerets. 



The egg is covered by a leathery egg-shell which bursts after 

 a certain time, and leaves the larva surrounded only by the 

 ' Kingsley, loc. cit. - J. iJoll. Tokyo, v., 1893, p. 53. 



