3038 Tue ZooLtocist—May, 1872. 
rear. It was a red-letter day for the aquarian, and J fear that 
the red-letter label over his head attracted more attention than the 
animal itself: it ran thus— 
NORWEGIAN LOBSTERS 
AND 
STICKLEBACKS 
and had I been appointed umpire I think I could scarcely have 
decided whether the majority of votes were in favour of his being 
a lobster or a titler: I must, however, abandon that moot point to 
the interlocutors. 
The first thing that struck me on reaching the aquarium was the 
total dissimilarity between the new arrival and any representation 
I had seen of Sepia officinalis; and yet these portraits are as 
numerous as those of the Sumatran rhinoceros or the Claimant 
to the Tichborne estates, and I think pictorial popularity can 
scarcely go farther. It is utterly impossible that the artist, in 
taking any existing portrait of the cuttle, had the living animal 
before him: there is, moreover, so great a family likeness in these 
portraits of Sepia, as to suggest the idea that they have all been 
copied from some engraving of remote antiquity, and that that 
engraving was intended as a diagram to show what a cuttle would 
probably be after death, rather than to give an idea of what he is 
when living. 
The creature floated on the surface of the tank, with a very small 
portion of its back above the water; it appeared to be in a feeble 
state, and although capable of displaying spasmodic activity at 
intervals, and of altering its position at all times, it evidently did 
not possess sufficient muscular power to enable it to dive or sink 
to the bottom; it may be said to have no specific gravity, and 
being lighter than water it was compelled to float on the surface. 
Its position is exactly represented in the figure; the posterior 
extremity is highest; the head is enormous, and has an appearance 
of ponderosity that reminds one of an elephant’s; the eye is of 
moderate size, and the creature seems to have the power possessed 
by cats of contracting the pupil at pleasure ; possibly a membrane 
which evidently covered the eye may, at the will of the animal, 
