90 THE OCEAN. 



Nature made when she meditated the formation of 

 the Lobster." Such expressions as these, however, 

 are no less unphilosophical than they are derogatory 

 to God's honour ; these animals being in an equal 

 degree perfect in their kind, equally formed by con- 

 summate wisdom, incapable of improvement, each 

 filling its own peculiar place in its own circle, which 

 the others could not fill. 



The Shrimp and Prawn, like the Lobster, have the 

 extremity of the body furnished with broad overlap- 

 ping plates, strongly fringed, which, expanding in 

 the shape of a fan, constitute a powerful fin. The 

 body, a little behind the middle, has a remarkable 

 bend downwards, though it may be brought nearly 

 straight. Their motion when swimming is very 

 swift, and in a backward direction, and is performed 

 by striking the water forcibly with tlie tail-fin, the 

 body being in a bent position. The Lobster is said 

 to project itself thus, by a single impulse, upwards 

 of thirty feet, and to dart through the water with 

 the fleetness of a bird upon the wing. The Shrimp 

 frequents the shallows, and congregates in numerous 

 shoals, which often leap from the surface. The 

 capture of them is usually left to the children of the 

 fishermen, who, wading in the shoal water, with a 

 net fixed at the end of a pole, take them with much 



ease. 



Under the appellation of Shell-/.^7i are familiarly 

 included animals having little connexion with each 

 other, and still less with fishes. The Fish, the Crab, 

 and the Oyster belong, in fact, to three of the grand 

 sections into which the animal kingdom is distri- 



