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SOME CEUSTACEAN GOSSIP FEOM GREAT 

 YAEMOUTH. 



By Arthur H. Patterson. 



It was a dull, lowering August day ; it might have been 

 November, but for the temperature. I went up Breydon to the 

 houseboat ' Moorhen ' on a big flood-tide, expecting all the way 

 to get a wet jacket, but reached the ancient "tub" while the 

 elements were yet hesitating. The wind had been -making all 

 points of the compass, and there was a broken, piled-up jumble 

 of clouds right down to the horizon all round. 



After dinner and siesta the tide had gone down to its lowest. 

 The Gulls were noisily prowling on the prostrate Zostera, picking 

 up here and there a stranded Goby, Shrimp, or Mudworm, 

 or skulking little Crab. Yarmouth, two miles eastward, was 

 enveloped in an obscuring smoky haze. There was a promise of 

 a thunderstorm, and a smart shower had commenced to fall. 



I put overboard the remnants of our dinner for the Shore 

 Crabs, but although the grease spread in enlarging concentric 

 rings, the aroma of it did not reach those skulking among the 

 pendant wrack at the little landing-stage, for the tide carried it 

 away. I have tried Carcinus mcenas again and again, and find 

 it trusts but little to its eyes — for sight does not stand for 

 much in the muddy water — and it is keener to see above than 

 before it, and trusts almost entirely to its sense of smell and 

 taste, or both. 



One Crab happened to be in luck's way, and its eagerness 

 seemed almost diabolical ; it ran into hiding with it, as an 

 Alligator hastens with its prey. To see this species working a 

 puddle, hungry for a meal, endeavouring to outwit and cap- 

 ture the Ditch Prawns (Palcemon varians) is most interesting; 

 disturb it, and it sinks into the ooze like magic. Immature 

 Starlings, reared in a marsh-mill on a most miscellaneous 

 dietary, were searching for small Shrimps, squirming Gammaridce > 



