316 COMMON OBJECTS OF THE SHORE. 



deprived of its sand tube, and placed in water with 

 a bed of sand and fragments of shells at the bottom, 

 it will in the course of four hours build a new 

 habitation ; but in winter, when the animal is 

 not in full vigour, it will require an hour or two 

 longer for its process. 



Many of the naked annelides are very beautiful, 

 and curling about in the waters of the rocky pool, 

 seem like glittering snakes. Some look like little 

 harmless creatures, but others seem to glance defi- 

 ance at us as they dart to the other side of the 

 pool, and hide themselves among the sea plants or 

 beneath some silvery shell. 



There is one advantage which the sea possesses 

 above any other of the scenes of Nature in this 

 portion of our globe, which is, that its aspect is 

 always beautiful under any change of season. 

 Winter strips our fields and hedgerows of their 

 leaves and flowers ; our streams lose their crystal 

 clearness, our meadows their robe of green; and 

 if we linger among the woodlands, admiring the 

 various forms of the leafless boughs, the strange 

 wild attitudes of some, the graceful disposition of 

 others, yet are they so much less lovely than in 

 the time when summer clothed them in their 

 green, or autumn in their gold, that were it not 

 for the music of the winter woods, the strange 

 wild harmonies made by the winds among them, 

 their beauties would not often long detain us in 

 our country walk. But the sea is always beautiful, 

 always musical, in sunniest or darkest day. Now, as 

 it ripples softly on the summer shore, the little surges 

 just falling on the pebbles, and maldng a sound as 

 gentle as that of an April rain on the forest leaves, 

 it is soothing and calming to the mind. Its con- 



