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CHAPTER VII. 



STAR-FISHES AND SEA-URCHINS. 



People seem to have a strange love for com- 

 prehending various descriptions of objects, whether 

 animal, vegetable, or mineral, under a single 

 term, and generally contrive to hit upon a word 

 which could not be rightly applied to any of 

 them. Take, for example, the word fish," as we 

 are speaking of marine objects. Not to mention 

 the whale, and other cetaceans, which are popu- 

 larly called by the name of fish, we have lobsters, 

 crabs, shrimps, oysters, limpets, mussels, &c., all 

 comprised in the term shell-fish." Then, we 

 talk of cray-fish, cuttle-fish, jelly-fish, and star- 

 fish, not one of the whole party having the very 

 smallest right to the title of fish. Still, custom 

 has so inextricably woven the name into the idea, 

 <ihat they cannot well be separated, and therefore 

 must be retained until the same power shall un- 

 weave its own web. These prefatorial remarks 

 must be my excuse for employing the word star- 



