THE "WONDERS OF THE SHORE. hi 



hour among the rocks, at low-water mark, or 

 walk, with an observant downcast eye, along the 

 beach after a gale, without finding some oddly 

 fashioned, suspicious-looking being, unlike any 

 form of life that we have seen before. The dark 

 concealed interior of the sea becomes thus in- 

 vested with a fi'esh mystery ; its vast recesses 

 appear to be stored witli all imaginable forms ; 

 and we are tempted to think there must be mul- 

 titudes of living creatures whose very figure and 

 structure have never yet been suspected. 



' O sea! old sea! wlio yet knows half 

 Of thy wonders or thy pride ! ' " 



Gosse's Aquariatn, \>p. 220, 227. 



But first, as after descending tlic gap in the 

 sea-wall we walk along the ribbed fioor of hard 

 yellow sand, 1)C so kind as to keep a sharp 

 look-out for a round gi-ay disc, about as big 

 a.s a i)cnny-picce, peeping out on the surface- 

 No ; that is not it, that little lump : open it, 

 and you will find within one of tlie common 

 little Vrniis f/iillina. — (They have given it some 

 new name now, and no tlianks to tlicm : they 

 arc always clianging the names, those closet col- 

 lectors, instead of studying the live animals 

 where Nature has put thcra, in wliich cjisc they 



