102 THE SEA-SHORE 



they breathe, and if you put them under a micro- 

 scope they look just like tiny bushes with brilliant 

 red leaves. 



You would think, perhaps, that when a lug 

 worm bores its way through the loose sand, 

 the sides of its burrow would fall in behind it 

 as fast as it passed along. But from the surface 

 of its body it pours out a thin, sticky liquid 

 which binds the sand together, and forms a 

 kind of lining to the burrow, like the brick- 

 work of a railway tunnel. The burrow is gener- 

 ally about two feet deep, and the worm always 

 lives in it with its head downwards. The worm 

 itself, when fully grown, is from six to ten inches 

 long. 



PLATE XXXIV 

 THE NEMERTES (l) 



This is quite one of the most curious creatures 

 to be found on the sea-shore. It hides under 

 large stones at the bottom of the pools, and 

 looks rather like a tangled boot-lace. But it 

 is really a kind of leech-like worm, and the 

 wonderful thing about it is that it can stretch 

 its body out to almost any length, just as if it 

 were made of elastic. It always does this in 

 catching its prey, which it seizes by means of 

 its sucker-like mouth, which has a kind of beak 



