- 33 - 



tre, hidden by the intermediate skin that connects the arms 

 at their base. This mouth is armed with hard mandibles, some- 

 thing like the bill of a parrot. When the animal breathes, we 

 see at one side of its body a slit or fold in the skin which 

 alternately opens and shuts and from which, when it is open, 

 protrudes a short thick tube or siphon, the movements of which 

 alternate with that of the slit. This latter opens into the cavity 

 that contains the gills, and through it the water enters. The slit 

 is shut during expiration, the exhausted water being expelled 

 through the tube or siphon. This organ also acts as a swimming 

 apparatus, for the impulse of the expiration drives the animal at 

 will backwards through the water, while the arms, rapidly exten- 

 ded or contracted, increase the strength of the stroke. With 

 its arms the octopus can also creep and climb as well as seize 

 and hold its prey. The arms are provided with a double row 

 of sucking-disks, which act as an adhesive apparatus. The food 

 of the octopus consists chiefly in crabs and fishes. The octopus 

 is a powerful robber, lying in ambush for its prey among the 

 rocks. In the Aquarium these creatures drag large stones into a 

 heap and hide behind them, and, in such a case, their power of 

 changing colour and imitating that of their surroundings is of 

 great use. They grow to a considerable size, and gigantic exam- 

 ples observed in the ocean are the historic germ of the legend 

 of the Kraken. Pliny relates a story of an animal of this kind 

 which came at night to the fish-tanks of Carteja, and frightened 

 the dogs away by its snorting and its terrible arms. Its head, 

 which was shown to Lucullus, was as large as a barrel holding 

 fifteen amphorae of wine; its arms were so thick that a man 

 could scarcely clasp them, and thirty feet long ; each sucking- 

 disk contained a jar of water, Montford told of an octopus that 

 tore a couple of sailors from the rigging of a ship near St. 

 Helena; the end of one of its arms, which caught among the 

 tackle and was hewn off, measured 25 feet. Later reports of a 

 gigantic octopus have been brought by the French ahip Alecto, 

 which met with one on the 30 November 1861 between Tene- 

 riffa and Madeira. The animal measured from 15 to 20 feet, 

 not reckoning its immense arms. Its colour was brick-red; its 

 eyes enormous, with a frightful rigid stare. Its weight was 

 reckoned at 2000 kilogrammes. After pursuing it for three 

 hours the crew only succeeded in cutting off part of its body. 

 The octopus is caught on all Mediterranean coasts; it is en- 

 ticed by bait, at which it rushes, and is then drawn up by a 



