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Confessions of a Beachcomber

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cuts a tomb for itself in the hard lime. Though it may burrow inches deep with no readily visible inlet, cutting and grinding its cavity as it develops in size and strength, yet it is not safe. Fate follows in insignificant guise, drills a tiny hole through its shell, and the toilsomely excavated refuge becomes a sepulchre. Even in the fastness of the coral "that grim sergeant death is strict in his arrest." All is strife--war to the death. If eternal vigilance is the price of liberty among men, what quality shall avert destruction where insatiable cannibalism is the rule. There is but one creature that seems to make use of the debris of the battlefield--the hermit crab (CAENOBITA), which but half armoured must to avert extermination fit itself into an empty shell, discarding as it grows each narrow habitation for a size larger. Disconsolate is the condition of the hermit crab who has outgrown his quarters, or has been enticed from them or "drawn" by a cousin stronger than he, or who has had the fortune to be ejected without dismemberment. The full face of the red blue-spotted variety (PAGURUS PUNCTULATUS) is an effective menace to any ordinary foe, and that honourable part is presented at the front door when the tenant is at home. For safety's sake the flabby gelatinous, inert rear end must be tucked and hooked into the convolutions of the shell, deprived of which he is at the mercy of foes very much his inferior in fighting weight and truculent appearance. The disinterested spectator may smile at the vain, yet frantically serious efforts of the hermit to coax his flabby rear into a shell obviously a flattering misfit. But it is not a smiling matter to him. Not until he has exhausted a programme of ingenious attitudes and comic contortions is the attempt to stow away a No. 8 tail into a No. 5 shell abandoned. When a shell of respectable dimensions is presented, and the grateful hermit backs in, settles comfortably, arrays all his weapons against intruders, and peers out with an expression of ferocious content, smiles may come, and will be out of place only when the aches of still increasing bulk force him to hustle again for still more commodious lodgings. A frilled clam (TRIDACNA COMPRESSA) in its infancy seals or anchors itself in a tiny crack or crevice, and apparently by a continuous but imperceptible movement analogous to elbow-rooming, deepens and enlarges its cavity as it develops. Should it survive in defiance of all its foes, just taking from the sea the sustenance for which it craves with gaping valves, it may increase in bulk, but its apartment in the limestone never seems too large--just a neat fit In its abiding-place it presents an irregular strip of silk, green as polished malachite, or dark green and grey, or blue and slaty green, mottled and marbled, with crimped edges and graceful folds--an attractive ornament in the drab rock. Touch any part--there is a slow suspensory withdrawal, and then a snap and spurt of water as the last remnant of the living mantle disappears between the interlocking valves of porcelain white. Apart from the bulk and the fantastic shapes of coral structures, there is the beauty of the living polyps. That which when dry may have the superficial appearance of stone plentifully pitted--a heavy dull mass--blossoms with wondrous gaiety as the revivifying water covers it. The time to admire these frail marine flowers is on an absolutely calm day. All the sediment of the sea has been precipitated. The water is as transparent as rock crystal, but like that mineral slightly distorts the object unless the view is absolutely vertical. It is a lens perfect in its limpidity. Here is a buff-coloured block roughly in the shape of a mushroom with a flat top, irregular edges, and a bulbous stalk. Rich brown alga hangs from its edges in frills and flounces. Little cones stud its surface, each of which is the home of a living, star-like flower, a flower which has the power of displaying and withdrawing itself, and of waving its fringed rays. Each flower is self-coloured, and may represent a group of animals. There are blues of various depths and shades from cobalt to lavender, reds, orange and pinks, greens, browns and greys, each springing from a separate receptacle. All are alike in shape--viewed vertically, many-rayed stars; horizontally, fir-trees faultlessly symmetrical in form and proportion. These flowers all blossom, or trees, or stars, are shy and timorous. A splash and they shrink away. The hope of such wilderness--as barren-looking as desert sandstone--ever blossoming again seems forbidden. Quietude for a few moments, and one after another the flowers emerge, at first furtively but gathering courage in full vanity, until the buff rock becomes as radiant as a garden bed. Upon coral blocks, which represent the skeletons of polyps in orderly and systematic profusion, other creatures more highly organised appear, having in one feature a family likeness to the polyps, upon whose hospitality they impose, that is, if the setting up of an establishment on the remains of innumerable ancestors of its host may be said to be merely an imposition. One is a species of mollusc which resembles, in some respects, that to which has been given the name of SURPULA. In its babyhood it attaches itself to the coral, and forthwith begins to build a home, which is nothing more than a calcareous tube, superficially resembling a corpulent worm, instantaneously petrified while in the act of a more or less elaborate wriggle or fantastic contortion. In this complicated tunnel the creature resides, presenting a lovely circular disc of glowing pink as its front door. A few inches beneath the water this operculum or lid is not unlike a pearl, but as you gaze upon it, it slips on one side, and five animated red rays appear, waving like automatic flag signals. Though well housed, it is almost as timorous as the coral polyps. Upon the least alarm the rays disappear in a twinkle, and the pink pearl trap-door glows again. Break off the end of the shelly tunnel in an attempt to secure the pearl, and it is as elusive as a sunbeam. It recedes as piece by piece is broken away, until the edge of the cylinder is flush with the surface of the coral in which the shell is embedded. There the pearly operculum glows in safety.

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