2S6 THE LIFE OF PHILIP HENRY GOSSE. 



these excursions I was his constant, and generally his only, 

 companion. He was in the habit of carrying a large 

 wicker basket, so divided into compartments as to hold two 

 stone jars of considerable capacity, and two smaller glass 

 jars. The former were for seaweeds, crabs, large fishes — 

 the rougher customers generally ; while the latter were 

 dedicated to rare anemones, nudibranchs, small crustaceans, 

 and the other fairy people of the pools. To me was 

 generally entrusted an additional glass jar, in a wicker case, 

 and sometimes a green gauze net, such as the capturers of 

 butterflies carry, which was to be used for surface-fishing, 

 and for gently shaking into its folds the delicate forms 

 that might be hiding in the seaweed curtains of large 

 still tidal pools. 



One important portion of our work on the shore con- 

 sisted in turning over the large flat stones in sequestered 

 places. Great discretion was needed in selecting the 

 right stones. Those which were too heavily set would 

 contain nothing, resting too deeply to admit the sea to 

 their lower surface. Those which were balanced too 

 lightly would be found deserted, because too frequently 

 disturbed. But the stone sagaciously chosen as being flat 

 enough, and heavy enough, and yet not too heavy, would 

 often display on its upturned under surface a marvellous 

 store of beautiful minute rarities — nudibranchs that looked 

 like tiny animated amethysts and topazes ; unique little 

 sea-anemones in the fissures ; odd crabs, as flat as farthinsrs, 

 scuttling away in agitation ; fringed worms, like bronzed 

 cords, or strings dipped in verdigris, serpentining in and 

 out of decrepit tufts of coralline. 



When our backs ached with the strain of stone-turningf, 

 we used to proceed further into the broken rockwork of 

 the promontory or miniature archipelago, and the more 

 serious labour of collecting in tidal pools, or on the retreating 



