COMMON OBJECTS OF THE SHORE. 323 



there were at least two species of more unusual 

 occurrence." One of them the writer describes as 

 scarcely larger than a shilling, inscribed with a 

 pretty orange-coloured wheel; the other like a 

 small brown hazel-nut. " As the evening closed," 

 continues this author, " and the depths beneath 

 presented a dingier and yet dingier green, until at 

 length all had become black, the distinctive colours 

 of the Acalephse, the purple, the orange, and the 

 brown, faded and disappeared, and the creatures 

 hung out, instead, their pale phosphoruc lights, like 

 the lanterns of a fleet, hoisted high to prevent col- 

 lision in the darkness. Now they gleamed dim 

 and indistinct, as they drifted undisturbed through 

 the upper depths, and now they flamed out bright 

 and green like beacon torches, as the tide dashed 

 them against the vessel's sides." 



All may not have seen our beautiful Medusae to 

 such advantage, though most persons who have 

 sailed on the sea have met with masses of the 

 larger kind, which seemed moving along in myriads; 

 and all who have rambled on the shore have seen 

 the large gelatinous transparent discs of some, 

 surrounded with a fringe-like margin, dilating and 

 contracting as they swam just below the surface 

 of the water. Not a walk of any extent can be 

 taken along the shore, in summer time, at low tide, 

 but we meet with that species which is the com- 

 monest of all the British jelly-fishes, the common 

 Aurelia (Aurelia aurita), with a clear bluish gela- 

 tinous disc, fringed with thread-like tentacula, 

 often measuring nearly a foot across, and easily de- 

 scribed. It has four long arms with fringed edges, 

 coming from the centre of its umbrella-like expan- 

 sion. Between each pair of arms is a raised 



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