ORDER I. DECAPODA. 259 
picked fibres of cocoa-nut husks, on which it rests as on a bed. Its habits 
are diurnal; but every night it is said to pay a visit to the sea, no doubt for 
the purpose of moistening its branchiw. It is very good to eat, living as it 
does on choice vegetable substances ; and the great mass of fat accumulated 
under the tail of the larger ones sometimes yields, when melted, as much 
as a quart of limpid oil. 
Pagurus. — The Hermit Crabs. The Pagurians have the four hind 
legs much smaller than the preceding. The tail is long, soft, and narrowed 
at the tip. As Nature has provided them with no sufficient covering or 
protection, they have “to look about them for some shelter; and this is af- 
forded them by several conchiform shells, bace’na, merit, in which they 
so tenaciously insert their hooked tails, as if both were grown together. So 
long as they are young and feeble, they content themselves with such shells 
as they find empty on the strand; but when grown to maturity, they attack 
living specimens, seize with their sharp claws the snail, ere it can withdraw 
into its shell, and, after devouring its flesh, ereep, without ceremony, into 
the conquered dwelling, which fits them like a coat when they take a walk, 
and the mouth of which they close, when at rest, with their largest forceps, 
in the same manner as the original possessor used his opereulum or lid. 
How remarkable that an animal should thus find in another creature, belong- 
ing to a totally different class, the completion, as it were, of its being, and 
be indebted to it for the pretecting cover which its own skin is unable to 
secrete ! 
“When the dwelling of the Pagurus becomes inconveniently narrow, the 
remedy is easy, for appropriate sea-shells abound wherever hermit, crabs 
exist. They are found on almost every coast, and every new scientific 
voyage makes us acquainted with new species. According to Quoy and 
Gaimard, they are particularly numerous at the Ladrones, New Guinea, 
and Timor, The strand of the small Island of Kewa, in Coupang Bay, was 
entirely covered with them. In the heat of the day they seek the shade of 
the bushes; but as soon as the cool of evening approaches, they come forth 
by thousands. Although they make all large snail-houses answer their 
purposes, they seem in this locality to prefer the large Sea Nerites.” 
The manceuvres of several species, when they have outgrown their hahi- 
tation, are quite ludicrous. Crawling slowly along the line of empty shells 
thrown up by the last wave, and unwilling to part with their now incom- 
modious domicile until another is obtained, they carefully examine, one by 
one, the shells that lie in their way, slipping their tails out of the old house 
into the new one, and again betaking themselves to the old one, should not 
this fit. In this manner they proceed until they have found a home to 
their liking. 
