CH. IX JOVBNEY THBOUGH MINAHASSA 223 



the Cape Verde Islands, but I cannot find it mentioned 

 anywhere that any other species lives as high above the 

 sea-level as my species from Tondano. 



One of the most interesting points about these Crustacea 

 is the curious tuft of hairs found on each of the pincers of 

 the first two pairs of claws. If these hairs be examined 

 with the microscope, it will be found that every one of them 

 is provided with a number of tiny recurved hairlets, shaped 

 Uke a sickle. As every hair is provided with some thirty or 

 forty of these hairlets, the tufts at the end of each pincer 

 must act as a very efficient scouring-brush, every tiny 

 particle of dirt and every microscopic animal and plant with 

 which they come in contact being retained in the hairy 

 mesh. It is very probable that the animal feeds by means 

 of these tufts of hair, first scouring the water-weeds and mud 

 for particles of food, and then, with the help of its hairy 

 mandibles and maxiUae, cleaning them off into its mouth. In 

 correlation with this habit of eating tolerably small and soft 

 food is the structure of the mandible, which is much more 

 delicate and hairy than most of the mandibles of the sea- 

 prawns. 



Atya Wyckii differs from other species of the same genus 

 in its small size and in the structure of the chelse. The 

 entire length of the largest specimens is not more than 

 seven-eighths of an inch, the females being usually one- 

 eighth of an inch longer than the males. The next largest 

 Atya is the Atya bisulcata, which is nearly an inch and a 

 half long ; many of the other species being twice or even 

 three times as large. In Atya Wyckii the chela is set straight 

 on end on to the carpal joint, as it is in a lobster or a prawn, 

 but in all the other species the carpal joint is somewhere 

 near the middle of the chela, so that its long axis lies 

 almost at right angles to the long axis of the Hmb. It may 

 be that the prawn in Tondano, isolated in this mountain 



