250 
CRAB-POND. 
of the mud, as we should by using the finger and 
thumb. At very short intervals, one or the other 
claw picks up some little morsel, — often so small 
that the spectator can only guess its presence by 
the action, — and carries it to the mouth with so easy, 
so hicman-like a motion, that I have been greatly 
pleased with it; exactly like a person feeding him- 
self with his fingers. That the eyes are not the 
guides to the situation of the morsels, I feel assured, 
for they are placed high up on the forehead, and 
point upwards ; and moreover, I have repeatedly seen 
the claws feel, and even pick up, from under the body, 
I have watched the progress of the Crab, too, to 
some morsel that I had thrown in ; no notice was 
taken of it, until the claw touched it, as it were, 
accidentally, in feeling round and round ; but the 
instant it was touched it was conveyed to the mouth. 
That the eyes do occasionally aid in the search is 
apparent ; but then the proceeding is different. The 
Crab leaps suddenly upon the object, and huddles, so 
to speak, over it, as if afraid of its getting away. In 
this, and in other actions, there is much resemblance 
to Spiders. I have sometimes thrown down to the 
Crabs crumbs of bread, or little bits of meat, to ob- 
serve their actions : if the piece be too large to be at 
once transferred to the mouth, it is held with one 
claw, while the other detaches morsels from it, and 
conveys them to the mouth ; just as I have seen a 
little pelagic Swimming-crab {Lupa) dismember a 
shrimp that he had caught, holding it in one claw, 
and picking it to pieces and feeding himself with the 
other. The Flat-crabs eat slowly : a fragment as 
