94 



CRABS AND INSECTS. 



window. One of these crabs (c, Fig. 105) is remarkable 

 in having a pouch in which the female carries her young ; 

 the sac is formed by a prolongation of the lateral plates 



of the abdomen. 



Land-Crabs. 

 Land-crabs are common 

 on all shores, m?.ny, as 

 the Ocypoda (Fig. 106), 

 living in ' holes, hiber- 

 nating in the winter, and 

 mimicking the sand in 

 their absence of color. 

 In the South the land- 

 crabs, Gecardnus (Fig. 107), that live in the bushes, are of 

 various tints, equally protective among the leaves of the 

 dead bay cedars and the fruit of the prickly-pear, about 

 which they cling. They are all swift runners, and in 

 Ceylon, a large land-crab is chased on horseback. 



FIG. 1 06. Ocypoda, a marine crab that 

 lives on land. 



FIG. 107. Gecardnus rusticola, a land-crab. 



NOTE At St. Paul's rocks Professor Moseley observed the richly 

 colored Grapsus, a land and water crab, carrying off young birds; and 

 at Ascension Island the large land-crabs even steal young rabbits from 

 their holes and devour them. 



