THE WHELK 19 



upon the beach in early spring, and if you open 

 one of them carefully, you will find a little baby 

 cuttle inside it 



PLATE VIII 



THE WHELK (i and 2) 



Everybody knows the shells of whelks by sight, 

 and you can hardly take a walk along the sea- 

 shore without seeing hundreds of them lying about 

 on the beach. And great numbers of whelks are 

 caught for human food, and also to serve as bait 

 for fishes. 



One very curious thing about whelks is the way 

 in which they lay their eggs. Very often indeed, 

 a$ you walk along the sandy sea-shore, you will 

 notice round clusters of yellowish white eggs, 

 which often go rolling along before the wind. 

 Each of these clusters is about as big as a cricket- 

 ball, and the eggs of which it is made up are 

 about as large as peas. Now these are the eggs 

 of whelks, and I think that every one who sees 

 them must wonder how these creatures can 

 possibly manage to lay such very big balls of 

 eggs. For each egg-ball is at least two or three 

 times as big as the biggest whelk. 



But, after all, the explanation is quite a simple 

 one. When the eggs are first laid they are very 



