THE MARINE AQUARIUM. 265 



















altogether one of the loveliest gems, in the opinion of him 
who writes, with which it has pleased God to bedeck his 
lower world. 
But you will want more than these anemones, both for 
your own amusement and the health of your tank. Micros- 
copie animais will breed, and will also die; and you need for 
them such scavengers as our friend Sguinado. Turn, then, a 
few stones which lie piled on each other at extreme low-water 
mark, and five minutes’ search will give you the very animal 
you want,—a little crab, of a dingy russet above, and on 
the underside like smooth porcelain. His back is quite flat, 
and so are his large angular-fringed claws, which, when he 
folds them up, lie in the same plane with his shell, and fit 
heatly into its edges. Compact little rogue that he is, made 
especially for sideling in and out of cracks and crannies, he 
carries with him such an apparatus of combs and brushes as 
sidor or Floris never dreamed of, with which he sweeps out 
of the sea-water at every moment shoals of minute animal- 
cules, and sucks them into his tiny mouth. Mr. Gosse will 
tell you more of this marvel, in his Aquarium, p. 48: 
Next, your sea-weeds, if they thrive as they ought to do, 
Will sow their minute spores in millions around them; and 
these, as they vegetate, will form a green film on the inside 
“of the glass, spoiling your prospect; you may rub it off for 
yourself, if you will, with a rag fastened to a stick, but if 
Jou wish at once to save yourself trouble, and to see how 
all emergencies in Nature are provided for, you will set 
or four live shells to do it for you, and to keep your 
Subaqueous lawn close mown. 
‘That last word is no figure of speech. Look among the 
à of sea-weed for a few of the bright-yellow or green sea- 
-o ls. For the present, they will only nibble the green 
ulve, but when the film of young weed begins to form, gos 
am it mown off every morning as fast as it grows, m 
at yw micircular sweeps, just as if a fairy’s scythe had been 
= Work during the night 
NATURALIST, VOL. II. 34 

