"ROBBER-CRABS" 



tortoise's eggs remain underground for ten or twelve 

 months. 



The European pond-tortoise is still found in Southern 

 and Central Europe, but it disappeared from England with 

 the beaver, the roe-deer, and the pelican long ages ago. 

 As a " pet, 11 however, it is by no means uncommon, and it 

 is frequently exhibited for sale in London shops and else- 

 where. 



If that highly imaginative person Baron Munchausen had 

 informed his friends that one day he had landed upon an 

 island where, on penetrating into a forest several miles from 

 the sea, he came upon some immense crabs busily engaged 

 in digging holes in the ground, whilst others were climb- 

 ing trees and gathering cocoa-nuts, his friends would prob- 

 ably have said, " Oh, come now, Baron, we don't mind be- 

 lieving that little story about the whale, but this is too 

 much ! " Yet there are such crabs millions of them : which 

 is probably the reason why Baron Munchausen did not tell 

 the story. 



There are several species of land-crabs, but perhaps the 

 most famous of them all is the great Robber-crab (Birgos 

 latro\ which is found on islands in the Indo-Pacific seas a 

 creature of immense strength, which climbs palm trees and 

 breaks open cocoa-nuts, and lives in a den which it digs for 

 itself in the earth. Darwin gives an interesting description 

 of these extraordinary animals, which is well worth quoting 

 at length. He says: "I have before alluded to a crab 

 which lives on cocoa-nuts : it is very common on all parts of 

 the dry land, and grows to a monstrous size : it is closely 

 allied or identical with the Birgos latro. The front pair of 

 legs terminate in very strong and heavy pincers, and the 

 last pair are fitted with others weaker and much narrower. 

 It would at first be thought quite impossible for a crab to 



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