224 TOILERS IN THE SEA. 



thickly crowded in the larger part of the skin or 

 walls of the tentacles and about the mouth, also in 

 the visceral cavity in white cords hanging in folds 

 from the edge of the septa. Thus the polyp is 

 armed inside and out. The mollusk or crab that 

 has the ill luck to fall, or be thrown by the waves, 

 on the surface of the pretty flower is at once pierced 

 and poisoned by the minute lassoes, and is rendered 

 incapable of resistance." l 



In the particular form of lasso-cell, here figured 



FIG. 45. LASSO-CELL OF MADREPORE. 



(fig. 45), the cells are perfectly transparent, colourless 

 vesicles, of a long ovate figure, larger at one end than 

 the other. One of average size is one two-hundred- 

 and-fiftieth of an inch in length, and about one two- 

 thousandth of an inch in diameter, at its widest part. 

 In the upper and larger half of the cell a longitudinal 

 chamber of a spindle-shape is seen passing down- 

 wards through its centre, tapering to a point at each 

 end ; the upper point merges into the walls of the 

 cell at its extremity, whilst the lower point, after 



1 Dana, " Corals and Coral Islands," p. 13. 



