66 
ANIMAL LIFE ON THE 
The name of " sea egg," in my opinion, entirely refei-s 
to the smooth specimen, not on account of its structure? 
which is not exactly egg-shaped, but rather to its smooth 
appearance, and particularly to its habit of always being 
found nestling in the sand. The burroAving proclivities of 
this creature must be for some particular purpose, but what 
that is I have not yet been able to discover. I suspect, 
however, it is for the purpose of feeding upon the warm 
life below. 
Taking the creature up in our hand, the question very 
naturally suggests itself, how can such a round, headless, 
footless object accomplish the feat of burrowing in the sand? 
Placing it ashore upon the dry beach it remains as motion- 
less as a stone. Under the atmospheric pressure the sand 
of the beach becomes to it as hard as adamant, and as 
impossible to penetrate; but the moment the water flows 
over it the circumstances are changed, and the creature, being 
no lover of the light, very soon shows symptoms of life in 
getting down into his dark abode. E>amining the spines 
on the under portion of the shell, an almost triangular band 
will be observed extending from the inner angle at the 
mouth near the middle to the square on the outer edge. 
This band suggests to the beholder the appearance of a 
brush, so regularly set are the rows of spines; and when 
these objects are examined with the lens they are found to 
be constructed like a little paddle, almost identical in shape 
to the round-mouthed, curve-shaped drain shovel of the 
navvy. These are the creature's diggers, having the blades 
swerving to the side in contradistinction to the very slender 
spines of the other bands, which all point or incline to an 
opposite direction. Thus, we see, the particles of sand are 
raised by the one set of brushes and thrown in upon the 
others, which, in turn, working in an opposite direction, cast 
