EARLY MEMORIES 43 



Hastings Pier, rambles among the rocks, which 

 the ebb tide uncovers over a considerable area 

 along the Sussex foreshore, gave us both bait and 

 recreation in getting it. Mussels, limpets and 

 crabs, both hermit-crabs and the green kind just 

 changing its shell, were the chief contributions. 

 The soft-backed green crab is irresistible and 

 defenceless, and is in fact promptly swallowed by 

 any fish that encounters it, acting no doubt on 

 that principle of universal brotherhood, which 

 Prince Kropotkin has so touchingly described as 

 permeating the animal world. Lugworms, a dis- 

 gusting, though deadly, bait for almost every 

 kind of fish, were dug in quantity by the long- 

 liners on the sandflats out near Bopeep and Bex- 

 hill, but we could procure enough for our purpose 

 on the sands among the rocks. Our only diffi- 

 culty in this quest was with the bathing-machine 

 proprietors, who declared, not unreasonably, that 

 our worming forays left pitfalls that would drive 

 their clients elsewhere. The schoolboy, happy, 

 primitive savage, finds pleasure even in digging 

 a lugworm from its lair. Twenty years later he 

 would sooner write out a thousand Greek lines. 

 Still, there is a moment's interest when, having 

 dug deep enough, you just catch a glimpse of the 

 unsavoury recluse disappearing in his burrow, like 

 a train entering a tunnel. You drop the spade, 

 fall on your knees beside the shaft and, thrusting 



