FIDDLER CRABS 217 



always pushing himself forward when the daily box 

 of grasshoppers is brought to the cage, and always 

 refusing any but the softest and greenest. One day 

 I thought I would surprise, and perhaps even terrify 

 him, by letting loose, instead of the accustomed grass- 

 hoppers, a fine, healthy, new-hatched imago of the 

 larger Indian death's-head moth [Acherontia lachesis) 

 a creature that, when interfered with, makes with its 

 proboscis a sharp and alarming strident sound. The 

 bulbul attacked it at once, and though the moth 

 stridulated loudly and fought vigorously, the bird 

 never once flinched, and was soon tearing the dead 

 body of its noisy victim to pieces. 



The crabs of the genus Gelasimus, commonly 

 known as fiddler-crabs, are very closely related to the 

 Ocypodes : they live together in the same way in 

 large companies and lead the same sort of life, except 

 that they prefer mud fiats to sandy shores ; and they 

 are exposed to the same enemies, whom they avoid in 

 the same way, by burrowing. But whereas among 

 the Ocypodes both sexes are exactly alike, among the 

 Gelasimi the male and female are very different from 

 one another. The difference between the two sexes 

 is most emphasised in the nippers or chelipeds, for 

 while in the female these are slenderer and much 

 shorter than the legs and are used chiefiy in feeding, 

 in the adult male the *'hand" alone of one of them 



