CRINOIDE&. 263 



collections, but in their dried state they represent very imperfectly 

 the elegance and particular grace of this curious type of beings. To 

 understand the star-fishes, they must be seen in an aquarium, where 

 we can admire the form, figure, movements, and manners of these 

 marvellous beings. 



The Asterias are the planets of the sea. It may be said that 

 heaven, reflected during the night on the silvery surface of the ocean, 

 let fall some of those stars into its depths which decorate the re- 

 splendent vault. 



CRINOIDE^E. 



We quoted the maxim of Linnaeus in the earlier pages of this 

 volume, that Nature makes no leaps. Nature proceeds by means of 

 insensible transitions, rising by degrees from one organic form to 

 another. Most of the animals hitherto described are immovably fixed 

 to some solid object ; at least, such is their condition in the adult 

 state. We are about to describe Echinoderms free of all fetters ; 

 animals " which walk in their strength and liberty " at one time of 

 their existence, while at others they are fixed and stationary. 



The Crinoideae, the first family of Echinoderms, are mostly 

 attached to marine rocks by a sort of root, having a long flexible 

 stem, which enables them to execute movements in the circle 

 limited only by the length of this stem, just as the ox or goat in our 

 paddocks is confined by its tether to the space circumscribed by the 

 length of its rope. 



Let the reader picture to himself a star-fish borne upon the 

 summit of a flexible stem firmly rooted in the soil, and he has a 

 general idea of the form of some of the Echinoderms which compose 

 the family of the Crinoideae. Naturalists of the seventeenth century 

 bestowed the name of stone lilies on these curious products. This 

 rather poetical name proves that the conformation of these creatures 

 had at an early period attracted observation, presenting the naturalist 

 with the most curious of his lessons. The encrinites raise up, as from 

 the dead, a whole world buried in the abyss of the past. At the 

 present time only a few genera of these Echinoderms exist, whilst in 

 the early ages of the world the ocean must have swarmed with them. 

 Crinoids abounded in the seas during the transition and secondary 

 epoch. It was one of the most numerous of the families which 

 inhabited the salt waters of the ancient world. In traversing some 

 parts of France, we tread under our feet myriads of these beings, 

 whose calcareous remains form vast beds of rock. The Encrinites 

 gradually disappeared from the ancient seas; their species were 



