58 NATURAL HISTORY READER. 



form are intended. The creature is really a polyp, a soft, 

 almost pulpy, sac-like structure, with a fringe of tentacles, 

 like a halo of rays, around the upper end ; in the center of 

 the circular fringe, the mouth, or oral aperture, being situ- 

 ated. Hence, it is often spoken of as an actinia, which 

 really means possessing rays. The word is now worked 

 into another word, Actinozoa, meaning rayed animals, that 

 is to say, animals with rays around an oral disk. But the 

 term is used to designate a class ; hence, it includes all the 

 polyps, those that construct coral, and the others. This 

 class is again divided into several orders, one of which is 

 named Zoantharia, or, as it is sometimes called, the Heli- 

 anthoid polyps. It is in this order that the actinia proper 

 is found ; and, therefore, it is there that we must find our 

 sea-anemone. 



3. Taken in the hand, the sea-anemone imparts a slip- 

 pery feeling, and it seems to have the consistency of leather. 

 As the actinia erects itself, attached to a rock or stone, it 

 looks like one of the purses formerly fashionable, if one 

 such could be made to stand of itself erect, and have the 

 frill around the upper end to project in a circle. But we 

 must be more particular than this. The upright part, that 

 which is called by naturalists the column, is hollow, like a 

 sack. Its base is really a sucking surface, enabling it to 

 adhere to any hard object. By this sucking base it can 

 glide, or travel along, much like a snail. 



4. And, as it thus moves, it can keep its flower spread 

 out, and its many tentacles in constant play — in fact, fish- 

 ing on the way. Their movement is, however, very slow. 

 Indeed, a "snail-pace" would be alarmingly fast for an 

 actinia. We have watched them attentively, and have 

 found that an inch in an hour was a very satisfactory per- 

 formance. At the top is an opening, called the oral cavity, 

 which, in the rosea, is surrounded just inside with a bead- 

 ing of little dots. This opening may be called the mouth, 



