!^8 Secrets of the Ocean [FOURTH WEEK 



creatures, and even if the five arms are torn apart, five 

 starfish, small of arm but with healthy stomachs, will soon 

 be foraging on the oyster bed. 



But to return to our tide-pools. In the skimming net 

 with the young starfish many other creatures are found, 

 some so delicate and fragile that they disintegrate before 

 microscope and camera can be placed in position. I lie 

 at full length on a soft couch of seaweed with my face 

 close to a tiny pool no larger than my hand. A few arma- 

 dillo shells and limpets crawl on the bottom, but a frequent 

 troubling of the water baffles me. I make sure my breath 

 has nothing to do with it, but still it continues. At last 

 a beam of sunshine lights up the pool, and as if a film had 

 rolled from my eyes I see the cause of the disturbance. 

 A sea-worm or a ghost of one is swimming about. 

 Its large, brilliant eyes, long tentacles, and innumerable 

 waving appendages are now as distinct as before they had 

 been invisible. A trifling change in my position and all 

 vanishes as if by magic. There seems not an organ, not 

 a single part of the creature, which is not as transparent 

 as the water itself. The fine streamers into which the 

 paddles and gills are divided are too delicate to have 

 existence in any but a water creature, and the least attempt 

 to lift the animal from its element would only tear and 

 dismember it, so I leave it in the pool to await the return 

 of the tide. 



Shrimps and prawns of many shapes and colours 

 inhabit every pool. One small species, abundant on the 

 algae, combines the colour changes of a chameleon with 

 the form and manner of travel of a measuring-worm, 



