116 AUTUMNS IN AEGYLESHIRE 



I do not exactly know ; whether it yearns for 

 carriage exercise or the leavings of a crab's food, 

 but the fact is undoubted, and it is the delicacy 

 of the hermit crab that makes the cloak anemone 

 so difficult a creature to keep in confinement. 

 There is another, a rarer and more beautiful para- 

 sitic anemone, which also lives upon the out- 

 side of shells, specimens of which I have taken 

 near this very spot ; but it seems to prefer long 

 spiral shells, and, although it selects inhabited 

 hermitages, does not insist upon dying of grief 

 or starvation if the original usurper relinquishes 

 possession. I have kept and admired these for 

 months, living on empty shells, and returned 

 them to the sea alive and flourishing at the 

 end of my holiday. 



I have not half exhausted the description of 

 my haul, although by no means a first-rate or 

 exceptional one ; but it is time to turn round and 

 have another look at the cattle ; so I will leave 

 the description of the numerous starfish, tube- 

 worms and smaller creatures for another dredge. 

 There is nothing here that I am not pretty sure to 

 get again before the day is over. There are all 

 the beasts, black, red, and dun, collected on the 

 spit of land nearest to the water with a line of 

 men and dogs behind them. Splash ! In goes 

 the first, and the rest soon follow, boldly enough, 

 when once they have made up their minds. Two 

 or three of the dogs pursue them into the sea, 



