106 THE SEA SHORE 



are almost sure to see that he is moving. Very 

 slowly he begins to glide along the bottom of 

 the pool. If he comes to a stone, he glides 

 over it. If he comes to a rock, he glides up it. 

 Then, if you suddenly snatch him out of the 

 water, and turn him upside down, you will see 

 his legs little white fleshy objects waving about 

 all over the lower surface of his body. And if 

 you look a* them through a good strong magnify- 

 ing-glass, you will see that each one has a kind 

 of little cup at the end of a slender stem. 



Now this cup is really a sucker, very much 

 like the suckers of a cuttle, only of course a 

 great deal smaller. And the starfish walks by 

 pushing one or two of its rays forward, taking 

 hold of the ground with the suckers underneath 

 them, and then pulling up the hinder rays and 

 taking hold with the suckers underneath those, 

 and so on over and over again. 



PLATE XXXV 

 THE FIVE-FINGER STARFISH (i) 



This is by far the commonest of all the star- 

 fishes. You can seldom walk for even a short 

 distance along the shore without seeing it. 

 And no doubt you might think that it must be 

 a very harmless creature indeed, for it does not 



