CRUSTACEA. 521 



it there the more quickly. Another species of Hermit Crab makes a 

 companion of the wan tied anemone. " And we are assured," says 

 Moquin-Tandon, " that when the crab dies its inconsolable friend is 

 not long in succumbing also." 



" Is there not here much more than what our modern phy- 

 siologists call automatic movements, the results of reflex sensorial 

 action?" says Gosse. "The more I study the lower animals, the 

 more firmly am I persuaded of the existence in them of psychical 

 faculties, such as consciousness, intelligence, skill, and choice ; and 

 that even in those forms in which as yet no nervous centres have 

 been detected." 



As an article of food we think that the lobster far excels the 

 crab ; like the latter, they have an amazing fecundity, each female 

 producing from 12,000 to 20,000 eggs in a season ; and wisely is it so 

 arranged, otherwise the consumption would soon exhaust the supply. 



In France the size of the marketable lobster is regulated by law, 

 and fixed at twenty centimetres (eight inches) in length ; all under 

 that size are contraband. Every year the inhabitants of Blainville 

 proceed to Chaussy to fish for lobsters. They are taken in baskets 

 in the form of a truncated cone, the mouth of which is so arranged 

 that the animal can enter, but cannot get out. The numbers caught 

 by each fisherman and his family in a season may be estimated at 

 1,000 or 1,200, which realise to the family 1,300 or 1,400 francs, the 

 season lasting about nine months. 



Lobsters are collected all round our own coast for the London 

 market. On the Scottish shore they are collected and kept in per- 

 forated chests floating on the water, until they can be taken away 

 to market. From the Sutherland coast alone 6,000 to 8,000 

 lobsters are collected in a season. This process goes on all round the 

 coast, and as far as Norway, whence an enormous supply of the finest 

 lobsters are obtained, for which something like ,20,000 per annum 

 is paid, all these contributions being conveyed to the Thames and 

 Mersey in welled vessels. But these old-fashioned systems are being 

 rapidly superseded by the construction of artificial storing ponds, or 

 basins. Of these ponds Mr. Richard Scovell has erected one at 

 Hamble, near Southampton, in which he can store with ease 50,000 

 lobsters, which will thus keep in good condition for six weeks. 

 Mr. Scovell's tank is supplied from the coasts of France, Scotland, 

 and Ireland, where fine lobsters abound. He employs three large 

 and well-appointed smacks, each of which can carry from 5,000 to 

 10,000. On the west coast of Ireland alone, it is said, io ? ooo fine 

 lobsters a week might be taken, 

 R * 



