The animal life of our seashore With special reference to the New Jersey coast and the southern shore of Long Island . n-like Psolus of the New Englandcoast, these processes, or rather their representa-tives, are developed into an armor of stout over-lapping scales or plates. Placed in a dish of sea-water, the habits of thisinteresting creature can be studied at leisure, theregular rhythmic or wave-like motion of the bodyproving a never-failing source of surprise to thoseto whom the animal is a novelty. At some-mo-ments it has contracted into a nearly perfect ball,at other times it has straigh
The animal life of our seashore With special reference to the New Jersey coast and the southern shore of Long Island . n-like Psolus of the New Englandcoast, these processes, or rather their representa-tives, are developed into an armor of stout over-lapping scales or plates. Placed in a dish of sea-water, the habits of thisinteresting creature can be studied at leisure, theregular rhythmic or wave-like motion of the bodyproving a never-failing source of surprise to thoseto whom the animal is a novelty. At some-mo-ments it has contracted into a nearly perfect ball,at other times it has straightened itself to doubleits usual length. Frequently it throws off parts ofthe posterior end of its body, accomplishing thiscurious freak either by close constriction, or by theforcible expulsion of its intestines. In feeding, the 80 STAR-FISHES, SEA-URCHINS, ETC. Synapta takes in large quantities of fine pebbles,sand, and shell, from which it doubtless extractsconsiderable nourishment. These objects are dis-tinctly visible through the walls of the body andintestine. A much stouter form of the sands is the Caudina,. Caudlna abenabia. which is sometimes .thrown up in considerable num-bers after a storm. Its color is light yellowish, thetexture is tough, and in a distant way the animalmight be likened to a cucumber greatly attenuatedat one extremity. IV. OUR CARCINOLOGICAL FRIENDS. Among our first acquaintances of the sea-shoreare sure to he a number of those merry spriteswhich have not yet mastered the lesson of how towalk straight—or rather, we should say, walkstraight ahead, for if many of the crabs havefailed to acquire the habit of following in thedirection towards which the head points, they havewell acquired the art of diverging straight from itat a right angle. It is certainly one of the most in-teresting sights of the shore to observe these appar-ently one-sided creatures hurrying off in their lat-eral progression, making probably for their burrowsin the sand or mud; pas
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, booksubjectmarineanimals, bookye
