CRUSTACEA. 525 



the Scottish coast, and off the Bay of Dublin. It is considered the 

 most delicate of all the Crustaceans. 



Before concluding this chapter, we perhaps should not omit brief 

 notices of the common prawn (Palcemon strratus] and the shrimp 

 (Crangon vulgaris, Fig. 347) as types of the order Amphipoda. Species 

 of this order are found to inhabit all seas, and many of them perform 

 important functions as regards the sanitary state and economic con- 

 dition of the waters of the ocean. These small animals are the 

 scavengers of the sea they pick up and devour all dead matter, 

 leaving (it may be) a clean skeleton, without a shred of fibre behind. 

 In this respect they resemble the ants on land, doing their work 

 always thoroughly and effectively. We need hardly mention, what 

 is so well known to every reader, that prawns and shrimps are 

 amongst the most esteemed delicacies at our table, and as articles of 

 food occupy no mean place on the fish-stall. It is hardly credible 

 what immense quantities arrive at Billingsgate alone and are daily 

 consumed jn London and the neighbourhood by all classes of the 

 community. The shrimp, which although the smaller crustacean, is 

 perhaps the finest flavoured of the two, is sold in r:<nch larger 

 quantities than its more aristocratic congener, the prawn. The 

 fishery of these savoury comestibles gives occupation not only to 

 regular able-bodied fishermen, who devote themselves to this branch, 

 but also to large numbers of women and children, who, with their 

 baskets and small nets, may be seen plying their vocation in a 

 multitude of well-known localities on our coasts, especially on the 

 southern and south-eastern shores. To the visitors of Hastings, 

 Southampton, Bognor, &c., there is not a more picturesque or 

 familiar marine picture than to behold a troop of little shrimpers, in 

 their grotesque equipments, wading patiently knee deep, all in a row, 

 as they push before them their pole nets. 



Without giving a detailed technical and anatomical description, 

 which our space will not permit of, we may observe that the common 

 prawn (Palcemon serratus) is about four or five inches long, with a 

 rounded carapace, which is jointed and furnished at the head with 

 numerous long antennae, the eyes being large and round. The tail 

 is broad and flat, the caudal laminae of which are furnished with long 

 hairs on the terminal margins. The animal is also furnished with 

 several pairs of feet, very slender, and ordinarily bent within them- 

 selves. 



The colour is light grey, spotted and lined with purplish shades. 

 In the water, however, prawns are almost transparent, from the nearly 

 entire absence of carbonate of lime in the carapace ; they are thus 



