SEA-URCHINS. 7 i 



with its dorsal crest like the teeth of a saw running 

 all down its back, might be seen lying out on the 

 branches of the trees, or playing bo-peep from a 

 hole in the trunk : or, in the swamps and morasses 

 of Westmoreland, the yellow Galliwasp (^Celestus 

 occiduus), so much dreaded and abhorred, yet with- 

 out reason, might be observed sitting idly in the 

 mouth of its burrow, or feeding on the wild fruits 

 and marshy plants that constitute its food. 



SEA-URCHINS. 



Feh. 9,\st. — I find Ijang on the sand and white 

 chalky mud in shallow water along the shore at Bel- 

 mont, some specimens of the large long-spined Echi- 

 nus that I had noticed in crossing the Bay. On 

 touching them, though cautiously, several of the very 

 acute points entered my fingers, and I thought were 

 broken off in the wounds ; for something black re- 

 mained there, and the part soon began to be tense and 

 painful. But this substance afterwards proved to be 

 merely a dark purple pigment, which came off" from 

 the spines whenever they were handled. The best 

 mode of lifting the specimens, which at first seemed, 

 on account of the points bristling in every direction, 

 to be impracticable, was by putting the fingers under 

 the animal; as the spines on the inferior side, that is, 

 those surrounding the mouth, are short and com- 

 paratively blunt. The projection of the mouth is of 

 a rich red-purple, and the spines and body pui'ple- 

 black. The spines, viewed through a microscope, 

 display a beautiful structure ; being each surrounded 



