Zoophytes. 



the number of animalculae that came within its reach would be relatively 

 small, for it does not grow to anything like the length of thuiaria, 

 antennularia, or obelia, and I fancy it requires about as much food. 

 Hence it selects a moving house one that can move considerable 

 distances. Now if you watch it whilst the crab is moving you will find 

 that the polypes are all on the hunt, ready to seize any unwary prey. It 

 gets many a knock as Mr Crab journeys over rocks and weeds, but 

 the sensitive person is always on the outlook for dangers ahead, and if 

 perchance Mr Crab should fall from a height, the spikes of chitin are 

 ready to bear up the shell and save the colony from being hurt. Most 

 of the nutritive polypes you will observe are on the under side another 

 discrimination, for when Mr Crab is feeding small bits of his food are 

 constantly being dropped and carried along on the tide. These they 

 readily seize and digest, and so get an abundance of food. It is strange 

 that when Mr Crab quits his shell for another larger one, the hydractinia 

 mourns his departure very much. He must take it very much to heart, 

 for he promptly and speedily dies a few days and he has gone the way 

 of many more. He has yet to learn the lesson taught him by his cousin 

 (I won't say of what degree) the sea-anemone, adamsia, for it settles on 

 the shell the hermit crab occupies, and as Mr Crab grows so he grows, 

 and develops a larger habitation for Mr Crab who thus does not develop 

 the longing for periodic flittings into a new house. If my theory about 

 the nutritive persons deriving food from the scraps of Mr Crab's meals 

 requires support his cousin adamsia is prepared to furnish it, for his 

 mouth and tentacles are on the under side and close up to the opening 

 left for Mr Crab's head. The tentacles are developed to run right across 

 so that no scraps escaping from the crab may be wasted in the vasty deep. 



This brings us to the end of our subject for to-night, but before 

 concluding I would like to mention briefly one or two of the many 

 animals I have found lying side by side with the hydroids. 



The worms we must pass over however interesting they may be, for 

 they would take up too much time. 



Foraminifera are found in various stages of growth, and as a rule 

 living when taken from below low water mark. To see these when fully 

 extended is a sight never to be forgotteu. I will not enlarge upon these, 

 but merely emphasise the rule I gave before, viz., allow as little time as 

 possible to elapse between collecting and examining. 



The larger species like the bottle-brush are the favourite haunts of 

 a certain class of shrimps. Regarding these shrimps, zoologists are at 



