240 HALF AN HOUR WITH CRUSTACEA. 



Crustacea, as well as upon any garbage it may come 

 across. It has a trick of pretending to be dead when 

 caught, and when it believes escape to be impossible. 

 The baskets in which the edible crab are caught 

 off the coasts of Norfolk, are usually baited with 

 dead fresh-water fish. The " Porcelain-crab " 

 (Porcellana platycheles) is a beautiful little animal, 

 also to be found underneath the stones at low water. 

 Its colour is reddish-brown, with pale yellow on the 

 under side. The foreclaws are exceedingly largely 

 developed for a crab of its size, and this is a good 

 means of knowing it at sight. If seized by these 

 claws it at once detaches them, and hurries off whilst 

 you are wondering at the suicidal amputation. 

 Another and allied species (Porcellana longicornis) 

 will perhaps be met with in the same places as the 

 former, but its small size, only a quarter of an inch 

 in length, and especially the inequality in the size 

 of its foreclaws, will prevent any mistake in its 

 identification. 



The " Pea-crabs " (Fig. 129) are worthy of notice, 

 if not for their size, at least because 

 they afford us an opportunity of free- 

 ing them from an ignorant suspicion 

 which has long been attached to 

 them. They are usually found living 

 in the shells of bivalve mollusca, 

 The Pea-crab (Pinno- especially in those of the common 

 mussel. Off the southern coasts they 

 seem to favour the shells of the Pinna for their 



