3994 Molluslcs. 



bottom. It is a little creature, rarely exceeding an inch in length ; 

 though the extensibility of the arms somewhat varies its dimensions. 



When we turn out two or three from the net into a pail of sea-water, 

 they are at first restless and active. They shoot hither and thither, 

 as if by a direct effort of will, but in reality by the impulse of rapid 

 and forcible jets of water, directed towards various points from the 

 mouth of the flexible funnel situated beneath the body. After a few 

 moments they suspend themselves in mid-water, hovering for many 

 seconds in the same spot, scarcely moving a hair's breadth either way, 

 but waving their large circular swimming-fins rapidly and regularly 

 up and down, just like the wings of an insect. Indeed, the resem- 

 blance of the little Cephalopod, in these circumstances, to a brown 

 moth hovering over a flower, is most close and striking, and cannot 

 fail to suggest an interesting comparison. The body is held in a 

 horizontal position, the large protuberant eyes gazing on either side, 

 and the arms, grouped together into a thick bundle, hang freely down- 

 wards. If you essay to count these organs, you find only eight; and 

 even if you are aware that one of the characters of the genus is to have 

 ten, of which two are much longer than the rest, you may search for 

 these latter a long time in vain. Of course I mean during the life and 

 health of the animal, when its impatience of being handled presents 

 obstacles to a very accurate investigation ; you may then turn it over 

 and over with a stick, and look at the bundle of arms from above and 

 below in turn, now grouped together, and now thrown all abroad in 

 anger at being teased ; still you can make out but eight. It was not 

 until after many trials that I at length caught a peep at the missing 

 organs — the pair of long arms, and discovered that it is the animal's 

 habit to carry them closely coiled up into little balls, and packed 

 down upon the mouth at the bottom of the oral cavity. If we manage 

 to insert the point of a pin in the coil, and stretch out the spiral fila- 

 ment, the little creature impatiently snatches it away, and in a twink- 

 ling rolls it up again. A zealous votary of the circular system would 

 seize on this analogy with the spirally folded tongue of a moth, and 

 triumphantly adduce it as additional proof that the Cephalopoda 

 represent, in the Molluscan circle, the Lepidoptera among insects. 



While thus hovering motionless in the water, the Sepioia presents 

 a fair opportunity for observing its curious transitions of colour, which 

 are great and sudden. We can scarcely assign any hue-proper to it. 

 Now it is nearly white, or pellucid, with a faint band of brown specks 

 along the back, through which the internal viscera glisten like silver. 

 In an instant the specks become spots, that come and go, and change 



