274 



THE INHABITANTS OP THE SEA. 



1 



formation, of numerous species, all constructed upon the same 

 fundamental plan, and all equally 

 perfect in their kind. 



Thus well provided with the means 

 for seizing and overcoming the strug- 

 gles of a living prey, the Cephalopoda 

 likewise possess adequate weapons for 

 completing its destruction ; for their 

 mouth is most formidably armed with 

 two horny or calcareous jaws, shaped 

 like the mandibles of a parrot, playing 

 vertically on each other, and enclosing 

 a large fleshy tongue bristling with 

 recurved horny spines. Hard, indeed, 

 must be the crab which can resist this 

 terrible beak ; and when the cuttle- 

 fish has once fixed on the back of a 

 fish, though much larger and stronger 

 than himself, it is in vain for the 

 tortured victim to fly through the 

 water : he carries his enemy with him 

 till he sinks exhausted under his mur- 

 derous fangs. 



Besides their arms, by help of which 

 the Cephalopods either swim or creep, 

 the forcible expulsion of the water 

 through the respiratory tube or in- 

 fundibulum serves them as a meana 

 of locomotion in a backward direction. 

 By those which have an elongated 

 body and comparatively strong mus- 

 cles, this movement is performed with 

 such violence that they shoot like ar- 

 rows through the water, or even like 

 the flying-fish perform a long curve 

 through the air. 



Thus Sir James Boss tells us, that 

 once a number of cuttle-fish not only 

 fell upon the deck of his ship, which 

 rose fifteen or sixteen feet above the water, and where mgre 



Arms and Tent acles of an 

 Onychoteuthis. 



f. Parts joined together by the mutual 

 apposition of the armed suckers. 



/. Terminal expanded portions bear- 

 ing the hooks. 



