BOOK IX. XLvi. 85-.\Lviii. 89 



full-grown. They alone of the soft creatures go out 

 of the water on to dry land, provided it has a rough 

 surface : they hate smooth surfaces. They feed on 

 the flesh of shellfish, the shells of which they break 

 by enfolding them with their tentacles ; and conse- 

 quently their lair can be detected by the shells lying 

 in front of it. And though the polyp is in other 

 respects deemed a stupid animal, inasmuch as it 

 SAvims towards a man's hand, it has a certain kind of 

 sense in its domestic economy : it collects everything 

 into its home, and then after it has eaten the flesh 

 puts out the refuse and catches the Httle fishes that 

 swim up to it. It changes its colour to match its 

 enviromiient, and particularly when it is frightened. 

 The notion that it gnaws its own arms is a mistake, 

 for this is done to it by the congers ; but the belief 

 that its tails grow again, as is the case with the ge( ko 

 and the lizard, is correct. 



XLVII. But among outstanding marvels is the The 

 creature called the nautilus, andby others the pilot- "^"''^"'- 

 fish. Lying on its back it comes to the surface of the 

 sea, graduaily raising itself up in such a way that by 

 sending out all the Avater through a tube it so to speak 

 unloads itself of bilge and sails easily. Afterwards it 

 twists back its two foremost arms and spreads out 

 between them a marvellously thin membrane, and 

 with this serving as a sail in the breeze while it uses 

 its other arms underneath it as oars, it steers itself 

 with its tail between them as a rudder. So it pro- 

 ceeds across the deep mimicking the likeness of a fast 

 cutter, if any alarm interrupts its voyage submerging 

 itself by sucking in water. 



XLVIII. One variety of the polypus kind is the Theozaem. 

 stink-polyp, named from the disagreeable smell of its 



