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tain, or whether lie believed that Hasselquist was deceived on 
the subject of the division to which it appertains, he made a 
brachyurous crab of it, referring to it the characters which 
Forskael had imposed upon it, and which he had communi- 
cated in one of his letters. 
We frequently find, more particularly in winter, pin- 
notheres in the muscles which are brought to market ; but the 
females are always observed to be in a state analogous to that 
in which a craw-fish is that has just changed its skin. The 
occasional deleterious quality of muscles has been attributed, 
though probably without reason, to the presence of these 
parasites. 
The Gecarcini are terrestria Crustacea, to which the 
French colonists of the Antilles commonly give the name of 
tourlourous and land-crabs. 
Pere Labat, in his Voyage to the French American Islands, 
&c., has collected several observations on these Crustacea 
Fie distinguishes four species of them ; the tourlourous , the 
violet-crabs , the while-crabs , and the ceriques . What he 
says of these last may answer for grapsus. They are found 
in rivers and on rocks, at the edge of the sea ; they are much 
flatter than the others ; their shell is thicker and harder; their 
biters, or pincers, though much smaller, do not pinch less ; 
they have also much less flesh and fat than the others, which 
causes them to be in less esteem, or at all events, they consti- 
tute the last resource of the negroes. Chauvalon, in his 
Voyage to Martinique, says, that the cericae of the sea, and 
which are not taken in the fresh waters, are the cire apoa of 
the Brazilians, or the xirika of Guiana. It is evident, ac- 
cording to the figure of the cire -apoa given by Marcgrave, 
that this crustacecum is a portunus. It is possible that the 
denomination of cerique may be common to Crustacea of dif- 
ferent genera. Those which he represents are certainly 
grapsi. According to Peron, the last species, and which ap- 
