time. Everything was on the smallest 

 scale ; little weeds, little stones, four 

 small minnows, a few small limpets, and 

 two anemones no bigger than thimbles. 

 It was a pretty little affair, the water 

 crystal-clear, as it will be when animal 

 life is carefully subordinated to vegetable, 

 and both to the body of water. The 

 white anemone, — the smart one, — took 

 up a position on the side of the jar, while 

 the pink, — the lazy one, — sat on bottom. 

 He always bloomed short and fat with 

 many short stubby tentacles, while the 

 white had but one row of long ones 

 crossing a slender, swaying stem. 

 Doubtless he could have been fat, but he 

 scorned it. No bit of food sank past him 

 when he was in bloom (and he was sel- 

 dom closed). Prompt and unerring, he 

 deflected his crown and swept in the 

 morsel as it passed, while the short-ten- 

 tacled one, — though he had two throats 

 to feed; the only instance I ever saw, — 

 never noticed anything until it was fairly 

 guided into his jaws with the whalebone, 

 when he swallowed it complacently, and 

 down both throats at once, if you took 

 pains to feed both. But he was very 

 dependent and not calculated to get on in 

 life, like the other. Both came to equal 

 grief, however. A basket of ferns de- 

 scended on their domain, and there was 

 general dismay. The minnows suffered 

 most, scraping off nearly all their scales, 

 struggling on the carpet among the bits 

 of glass. 



In the bigger tanks we had sometimes 

 sticklebacks, obtained by proxy from 

 some distant marsh : shrimps, ghostly 

 things which came from the market 

 packed in sawdust, and jumped up the 

 sleeves of the person who opened the 

 box; gunnel-fish, little dark-striped rib- 

 bons with orange fins ; and gobies, queer 

 little fish some two inches long, — all 

 great black head and long slender tail, — 

 with a sucking disc beneath the broad 

 chin, whereby they attach themselves to 

 a rock when contented, curling the tail 

 around to where an ear would be if they 

 had one. When they are not contented, 

 they swim round and round unceasingly 

 until something has to be done about it. 



For the farcical element we depended 

 on the hermit crab. What with his fre- 

 ([uent choice of an absurd misfit in the 

 way of a shell, his bustling, meddlesome 



ways and consequent difficulties, he is 

 distinctly the clown of the piece, the Duke 

 of Newcastle of the aquarium. If he be 

 a large specimen of his kind, he often 

 chooses to don a tiny bonnet of a shell 

 which sits on him ''like a button on a 

 gate-post," and scarce suffices to protect 

 his precious tail ; or, being small, he 

 wants to feel big, and bestows himself in 

 a great ark which overshadows him 

 altogether. This is irresistible, and 

 you give him a poke with the whale- 

 bone which turns him over on his back, 

 whereupon he draws in claws, feelers, 

 everything, and doubtless imagines you 

 think he has vanished from earth. 

 But he is too restless to hide long, 

 and his members soon reappear over 

 the lips of the shell, — the tiniest, 

 cunningest claws, shot with iridescent 

 blue, — with his feelers flourishing about 

 over them, taking observations. Then 

 out comes as much of the simple creature 

 as dimensions will permit, but his claws 

 will not come to the ground over the lip 

 of the shell unless he relaxes the grip 

 of his tail, and that is against all prece- 

 dent. Besides, he could not lift the shell 

 then, — and he stretches and struggles 

 and heaves until you take pity on him 

 and lend him a hand, when he hoists the 

 big shell on his back and shambles off, 

 with an air of having done it all him- 

 self. And he catches the corners of his 

 shell on everything, and he slews around, 

 and he sticks in narrow places and kicks 

 and pulls, and rolls off miniature 

 precipices in his enthusiasm ; always 

 active and never discouraged, however 

 thrilling his adventures, and however 

 visitors, to say nothing of housemates, 

 fling him about. 



His one weak point is a long, flexible, 

 unprotected tail which he bestows in 

 the back of a cockle — or natica — shell 

 in which he lives. Some unsympathizing 

 persons complain of the tinkling of this 

 shell against the glass and stones on cold 

 days. They say it makes them feel twice 

 as cold. But really now, what is there 

 in that? Cannot they move about and 

 warm their blood? They don't seem to 

 consider how he would feel without any- 

 thing to keep his tail in ! It is his last 

 expression of despair, — to show that tail 

 in public, except on the rare occasions 

 when he changes his own shell. Then 



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