Crabs, Lobsters, etc. 



wise of adaptation in structure between two objects 

 apparently so remote from each other in the scheme of 

 nature as a crab and a coconut-tree. The animal is 

 diurnal in its habits, but every night it is said to pay 

 a visit to the sea, no doubt for the purpose of moistening 

 its gills. The young are likewise hatched, and live for 

 some time on the coast. These crabs inhabit deep burrows, 

 which they hollow out beneath the roots of trees, and 

 there they accumulate surprising quantities of the picked 

 fibres of the coconut husk, on which they rest as on a bed. 

 The Malays sometimes take advantage of this, and collect 

 the fibrous mass to use as a junk. . . . To show the 

 wonderful strength of the front pair of pincers, I may 

 mention that Captain Moresby confined one in a strong 

 tin box, the lid being secured by wire ; but the crab 

 turned down the edges and escaped. In turning down 

 the edges, it actually punched many small holes quite 

 through the tin ! " 



Later observers, however, doubt if the crab uses its legs 

 to extract the contents of the nut. The robber-crab pro- 

 vides for a rainy day by storing his burrow with coconuts 

 during the fruiting season. Another of these land hermit 

 crabs, like its water-frequenting relatives, shelters its soft 

 body within a shell which it brings from the sea-shore. 

 Accidents happen even in crab families and sometimes 

 the shells are broken when the animal is far inland ; then 

 and then only the ingenious animal will cover itself with 

 a broken coconut shell, which serves as a substitute for its 

 earlier shelter. 



The hermit crabs are perhaps the most curious of all 

 the creatures of the sea-shore. Unlike the edible crabs, 

 the hinder parts of these animals are soft and need some 

 artificial protection. This usually takes the form of an 

 empty whelk shell, and with this portable home on its 

 back the hermit crab leads an apparently contented life. 

 When danger threatens the hermit simply retires into his 

 borrowed home and blocks up the entrance with the larger 



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