NATURAL HISTORY. 

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whn,ver he was, evidently had as strong a hold on the rocks as he had on 

 mv hand, and was not easily persuaded to let go of either. At last how- 

 ever he became convinced that he must choose between us and so let go 

 his hold upon the rocks, and I found clinging to my right hand by his long 

 anus a large octopod cuttle-fish, and I began to suspect that I had caught 

 a Tartar. °His long arms were wound round my hand, and these arms, by 

 the way, were covered with rows of suckers, somewhat like those with 

 which boys lift stones, and escape from them was almost impossible. I 

 knew that this fellow's sucking propensities were not his worst ones; for 

 these cuttle-fishes are furnished with sharp jaws, and they know how to 

 use them loo ; so I attempted to get rid of him. But the rascal, disengag- 

 ing one slimy arm, wound it around my left hand also, and I was a help- 

 less prisoner. In vain I struggled to free myself, —he only clasped me the 

 tighter. In vain I shouted to my companion, — he had wandered out of 

 hearing. I was momentarily expecting to be bitten, when the ' bicho ' sud- 

 denly .hanged his mind. I was never able to discover whether he was 

 ^mitten with remorse and retired with amiable intentions, or whether 

 be only yielded to the force of circumstances. At any rate, he suddenly 

 relinquished his hold upon my hands and dropped to the sand. Then 

 raising himself on his long, limsy arms, he stalked away towards the water, 

 mm king such a comical figure, that in spite of my fright I indulged in a 

 hearty laugh. He looked like a huge and a very tipsy spider, staggering 

 away on his exceedingly long legs." 



It would appear that Mrs. Hartt had an adventure with one of the 

 smaller species of cuttle-fishes; for one form which occurs in the West 

 Indies and the Mediterranean sometimes attains a length of nine feet and 

 a weight of sixty pounds, while another species which is abundant in 

 Alaska "reaches a length of sixteen feet, or a radial spread of nearly 

 twenty-eight feet, but the whole mass is much smaller than that of the 

 decapbdous cephalopods of lesser length. In the Octopus above mentioned 

 the body would not exceed six inches in diameter and a foot in length, and 

 the arms attain an extreme tenuity towards their tips." Mr. Emerton 

 has made paper models, life size, of this species, which may be seen in 

 the museums at Cambridge and New Haven. 



Professor Verrill has the following remarks upon the Octopi: "There 

 is no satisfactory evidence that any of these species of Octopus ever inten- 

 tionally attack man. or that any one has ever been seriously injured by 

 them. They are rather sluggish and timid creatures, seeking shelter 

 in holes and crevices among rocks. They feed mainly upon bivalve mol- 

 luscs and Crustacea, but will also eat fish, and may, perhaps, like lobsters 

 and crabs, devour the bodies of persons who have been drowned. There 



