SEA-ANEMONES. 



5°i 



reality extremely voracious, devouring large pieces of flesh, and sucking down 

 mussels and oysters. When fed in an aquarium, the long grasping tentacles 

 greedily surround the food, such as morsels of flesh, small fish, or crabs, given to 

 them, and convey it to the mouth ; not merely are the juices sucked out, but the 

 flesh itself is digested, only the fat being rejected. Well-fed anemones change 

 their skin frequently, no doubt because of their quick growth. During this 

 process, they remain closely contracted, expanding again after it is completed ; the 

 shed skin forming a loose, dirty-looking girdle round the base of the foot. Anemones 

 only settle in places where the currents bring them the animal food they need ; 

 and are most plentiful where the current is strongest, as, for instance, at the 

 entrance of harbours or on rocky coasts. Some species are in the habit of settling 

 on other animals whose requirements make them frequenters of disturbed waters, 

 hermit-crabs being especial favourites. Certain species again, such as the large 

 yellow - and - brown - striped Actinia effceta (see illustration below), are indeed 

 always found fixed upon the shells inhabited by 

 these crabs, the one mentioned being generally 

 found with Pagurus striatus, a large Mediterranean 

 crab which inhabits whelk -shells of suitable size. 

 Two or three of these anemones often settle on one 

 crab, which does not seem to be at all incommoded 

 by his burden, while the former profit in the matter 

 of food by the wanderings of their host. 



On account of the ease with which anemones 

 are kept in captivity, their manner of reproduction 

 has been well observed. With rare exceptions, they 

 develop from eggs. Dalyell kept one for six years, 

 and reared from it upwards of two hundred and 

 seventy-six young ones. Two of these young lived 

 for five years, producing eggs at ten or twelve 

 months old, which hatched a couple of months later. He saw that the ciliated, 

 infusorian - like larvae (see illustration on p. 500) settled down on the eightli 

 day, losing their cilia, the first tentacles appearing during the process of attachment. 

 Young anemones often pass through their whole development within the body- 

 cavity of the parent. Even in a free condition sea-anemones can easily be studied. 

 Gosse has well described the many British species, and Lacaze-Duthiers has given 

 a still more detailed account of several kinds studied in connection with their 

 development. He gives many details of the common European Actinia equina 

 found along the coasts of the English Channel in all rocky parts at low-water 

 level. Its colour varies between scarlet, rose-red, dark red-brown, and olive-green, 

 a distinguished characteristic being a -circle of beautiful blue warts below the 

 tentacles. 



Most anemones are provided with several circles of more or less similar 

 cylindrical tentacles, but there are some specially beautiful species which, besides 

 tentacles of the usual shape, have, either within or outside of the circle of ordinary 

 tentacles, lobed or leaf -like tactile and seizing organs. These belong to the family 

 of the Crambactinidw. The beautiful Crambactis from the Red Sea, shown in the 



a sea-anemone, Actinia effceta 

 (nat. size). 



