246 SHELLS AND HERMIT CRABS. 



for sin^arity of form and brilliancy of colouring I 

 may mention Holocentrum, five kinds of which were 

 procured here^ one brilliantly coloured with blue and 

 silver^ and the remainder more or less of a brig-ht 

 scarlet. 



The land-sheUs appear here to be limited to a soli- 

 tary Helicina, found on the leaves and trunks of 

 trees ; and the trifling" amount of rise and fall of tide, 

 not exceeding" three feet, prevented any search for 

 marine species upon the reef. By dredg'ing-, how- 

 ever, in some of the sandy channels among- the coral 

 patches, in two to three fathoms water, some small 

 Mitres, Nassce, Subulcs, and other interesting- shells 

 were procured, but no zoophytes came up in the 

 dredg-e, and hardly any Crustacea. One can scarcely 

 avoid taking- notice of the prodigious numbers of 

 small hermit-crabs fCtew-oJitoJ tenanting- dead uni- 

 valve shells, and occurring from the margin of the 

 beach as far back as the centre of the islands, where 

 they are foimd even in the holes of decaying trees at 

 some heig-ht above the ground. 



During- our stay at this anchorag-e the weather 

 was fine for the first three days, but afterwards was 

 usually hazy, with strong- breezes from between east 

 and south-east, with squalls and occasional showers, 

 the thermometer ranging- between 72° and 86° — ^re- 

 Sea. The family Sparidee is that best represented in the Louisiade 

 Archipelago so far as I could judge, — three species of Pentapus 

 numerically more than equal all the rest, and the next commonest 

 fish is Diacope octo-lineata. 



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