156 GLAUCUS ; OE, 



promise, shall come up at a single haul of the dredge, 

 entwining their long spine-clad arms in a seemingly 

 inextricable confusion of "kaleidoscope" patterns 

 (thanks to Mr. Gosse for the one right epithet), purple 

 and azure, fawn, brown, green, grey, white and crim- 

 son ; as if a whole bed of China-asters should have 

 first come to life, and then gone mad, and fallen to 

 fighting. But pick out, one by one, specimens from 

 the tangled mass, and you will agree that no China- 

 aster is so fair as this living stone-flower of the deep, 

 with its daisy-like disc, and fine long prickly arms, 

 which never cease their graceful serpentine motion, 

 and its colom^s hardly alike in any two specimens : 

 but handle them not too roughly, lest, whether in 

 modesty or in anger, they begin a desperate course 

 of gradual suicide, and breaking off arm after arm 

 piecemeal, fling them indignantly at tlieir tormentor. 

 Along with these you will certainly obtain a few of 

 that noble bivalve, the great Scallop, which you have 

 seen lying on every fishmonger's counter in Hastings. 

 Of these you must pick out those which seem dirtiest 

 and most overgrown with parasites, and place them 



