288 THE OCEAN WORLD, 
cases directly into forms like those from which they sprung. The 
bodies of certain species are lubricated by an acrid and corrosive 
fluid : thus H. oceania, described by Lesson, which is about forty 
Fig. 118.—Holothuria lutea (Quoy and Galmard). 
inches in length, secretes at the surface of its body an irritating fluid, 
which produces an intolerable itching in the finger which touches it. 
Nor can the inhabitants of the South Sea Islands look at it without 
loathing. Fig. 118 represents H. /utea, or the Stichopus luteus of 
Brandt, who describes as its distinctive character three rows of am- 
bulacral feet on the ventral surface. 
