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BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 
process have been studied by Max Braun ( 22 ), and more recently by Vitzou ( 197 ). As 
so often happens, there are many observations on this subject which either ignore the 
earlier and often better ones, or add nothing’ of value to our knowledge of the process. 
Hyatt, in remarking that, while the molting of the lobster had been previously de- 
scribed several times, “no professional naturalist” had “actually seen the process and 
recorded his observations,” appears to have overlooked the account of Sars ( 176 ), which, 
however, is not particularly circumstantial. 
Sars saw a lobster in the act of molting in July near Tananger, in Norway. He 
says : 
It had just been taken out of a lobster bos, and could be handled without its offering the slight- 
est resistance. The shell on its back was burst iu the middle, and the tail and the feet were nearly out of 
the old shell, while the largest claw stuck out only half its length. This latter portion of the change is 
evidently very dangerous, and, although I observed it for quite awhile, I could see little or no progress. 
This lobster was not a good exponent of the molting process. As soon as the 
larger claws begin to be withdrawn from the old shell the exuviation, under normal 
conditions, is speedily brought to a close. Nor is it true that the lobster “ouly reaches 
its former size after a considerable time has elapsed.” According to Sars, the lobster 
on the Norwegian coast molts chiefly in July. 
Both Couch ( 45 ) and Salter ( 174 ) have given accounts, at secondhand, of the 
molting of the European lobster. Couch, writing in 1837, says that the newly molted 
lobster shows great activity in effecting its escape, which is undoubtedly true in some 
cases, but not in all. The lobster whose cast shell is described escaped “through an 
aperture too narrow to have allowed it to pass if its new covering had possessed a 
very moderate degree of firmness.” He supposed that escape was effected by the 
cracking open of the shell, in the middle line, where he noticed that in life a faint 
stripe was perceptible. He observed in a lobster preparing to molt that absorption 
took place along this area, and inferred that the two halves of the shell were com- 
pletely separated when the critical moment came. Of the molting, he further says that 
“ it is not improbable that the general opinion is correct which limits the exuviation of 
the adult animals to once in the year,” and “general opinion” does not seem to have 
made much progress in clearing up this matter during the last fifty years. 
Salter’s account, published in 1860, is interesting on account of some extraordi- 
nary statements, such as that in molting the legs are extracted pair by pair, which of 
course is a physical impossibility, as Hyatt pointed out, and that the abdomen is the 
part first withdrawn from the old shell. This latter statement expresses exactly the 
reverse of what has since been found to occur. 
Wheildon ( 202 ) published in 1875 a short paper containing some interesting facts 
on the molting habits of the American lobster, which will be referred to again. 
The work of Vitzou, which appeared in 1882, is the best yet done on this subject. 
He treats of the histology of the old and new shell, and of the organic and “inorganic 
reserves,” which are supposed to be laid down in certain tissues with reference to the 
molting period. 
Hyatt’s paper ( 104 ), appearing in 1883, gave an accurate account of some of the 
phenomena of exuviation in this species. 
Packard in 1886 published some notes ( 147 ) in which very little is added to our 
knowledge of the subject. He says that “the integument of the legs is molted last, 
and when, owing to rough handling, the process is delayed, the extremities of the legs 
