THE STAR-FISH. 
35 7 
resisting sltells have been found in the stomachs of these 
voracious animals; and what is very extraordinary, though 
the substance of their own bodies be almost as soil as water, 
yet they are no way injured by swallowing these shells, which 
are almost of a stony hardness. They increase in size as all 
other animals do. In summer, when the water of the sea 
is warmed by the heat of the sun, they float upon the sur- 
face, and in the dark they send forth a kind of shining light, 
resembling that of phosphorus. 
They are often seen fastened to the rocks, and to the 
l a (rest sea-shells as if to derive their nourishment from them. 
If [hey be taken and put into spirit of wine, they will con- 
tinue for many years entire; but il they be left to the 
influence of the air, they are, in less than four and twenty 
hours, melted down into limpid and offensive water. 
In all of this species, none are found to possess a vent for 
their excrements, but the same passage by which they devour 
their food, serves for the ejection of their fceces. These ani- 
mals, as was said, take such a variety of figures, that it is 
impossible to describe them under one determinate shape ; 
but in o-eneral, their bodies resemble a truncated cone, whose 
base is applied to the rock to which they are found usually 
attached. Though generally transparent, yet they are found 
of different colours, some inclining to green, some to red, 
some to white, and some to brown. ^ In some, their colours 
appear dilfused over the whole smtace ; in some they aie 
streaked, and in others often spotted. They are possessed of 
a very slow progressive motion, and, in line weather they are 
continually seen, stretching out and fishing for their prey. 
Many of them are possessed of a number of long slender fila- 
ments, in which they entangle any small animal they happen 
to approach, and thus draw them into their enormous sto- 
mach, which fills the whole cavity of their bodies. The 
harder shells continue for some weeks undigested but at length 
they under™ a kind of maceration in the stomach, and be- 
come a part of the substance of the animal itself. I he indi- 
gestible parts are returned by the same aperture by which 
they were swallowed, and then the star-fish begins to fish for 
more These also may be cut in pieces, and every part will 
survive the operation ; each becoming a perfect animal, 
endued with its natural rapacity. Of this tribe, the number 
is various and the description of each would be tedious and 
tininstrnctive : the manners and nature of allure nearly as 
described ; but we will just make mention of one creature, 
which, though not properly belonging to this class, yet is so 
