102 "MANY ISLES AND STRANGE PLACES" 



able by a thorny tangled undergrowth of calamus and 

 other creepers ; but in places where the rock crops 

 out there are open patches of coarse grass, and near 

 the shore there is a pleasant fringe of coconut palms, 

 cycads, and screw-pines, carpeted by the convolvulus 

 {Ip077icsa bzloba), which in these tropical islands binds 

 the loose sand and shingle together, and always helps 

 the firm soil win of the watery main." This open 

 belt and the dry part of the beach beyond it is one 

 crawling mass of little hermit-crabs (Cenobitd), adapted, 

 like the robber-crab, for a life on dry land. When 

 alarmed, they slip hurriedly into their shells and drop 

 motionless as if dead, so that the noise of their fall 

 makes a continuous tinkle as you walk : they very soon 

 invaded our tent, where they might be heard falling 

 about any time of day or night. I once found one 

 of them busy, like a large bee, among the florets of 

 a coconut, which made me wonder whether they may 

 not sometimes play a part in fertilizing flowers. 

 Moseley, in his Notes of a Naturalist on the Chal- 

 lenger, has recorded the finding of a cenobite on a 

 bush 4 feet high, at the Admiralty Islands. 



In the thick jungle you find cenobites of larger 

 size, and great land-crabs [Cardiosoma hirtipes), of a 

 beautiful dark violet colour with scarlet nippers. 

 Though crabs are more in evidence than anything 

 else, there are other animals on the island besides the 

 herd of feral cattle. The Andaman pig is said to live 



