deposited upon the membrane, and in process of time the new shell becomes even harder and stronger than that which has been rejected.

Many species of Land Crab are known, some of which possess rather curious habits. The FIGHTING CRAB (Gelasimus bellator), is a good example of them. This species possesses one very large and one very little claw, so that it looks as if a small man were gifted with one arm of Hercules and the other of Tom Thumb. As it runs along, with the wonderful speed which belongs to all its kin, it holds the large claw in the air, and nods it continually, as beckoning to its pursuer. While so engaged it has so absurd an aspect that it has earned the generic title of Gelasimus, i.e. laughable. As may be conjectured from its popular name, it is a very combative species, holding its fighting claw across its body, just as an accomplished boxer holds his arm, and biting with equal quickness and force. It is also a burrower, and lives in pairs, the female being within, and the male remaining on guard at the mouth of the hole, his great fighting claw across the entrance.

Another Land Crab, which has earned the generic title of Ocypode, or Swift-footed, and is popularly called the RACER, from its astonishing speed, is a native of Ceylon, where it exists .in such numbers that it becomes a terrible nuisance to the residents. Having no respect for the improvements of civilization, this crab persists in burrowing into the sandy roads, and is so industrious at its excavations, that a staff of labourers is constantly employed in filling up the burrows which these crabs. have made. Were not this precaution taken, there would be many accidents to horsemen.

The mode of excavation employed by this creature is rather peculiar. It "burrows in the dry soil, making deep excavations, bringing up literally armfuls of sand, which, with a spring in the air, and employing its other limbs, it jerks far from its burrows. distributing it in a circle to the distance of many feet.”

THERE is a very remarkable burrowing crustacean, called the ROBBER CRAB (Birgus latro). This creature is of a strange, weirdlike shape, difficult to explain, but easily to be comprehended by reference to the illustration. The reader can, however, form some notion of its general form, by removing a common hermit

The

crab from its residence, and laying it flat before him. Robber Crab, however, does not live in a shell, and its abdomen is consequently defended by hard plates, instead of being soft and unprotected like that of the hermit crab, to which it is closely allied.

The Robber Crab inhabits the islands of the Indian ocean, and is one of those crustacea which are able to exist for a long time without visiting the water, the gills being kept moist by means of a reservoir on each side of the cephalothorax, in which the organs of respiration lie. Only once in twenty-four hours does this remarkable crab visit the ocean, and in all probability enters the water for the purpose of receiving the supply which preserves the gills in working order.

It is a quick walker, though not gifted with such marvellous speed as that which is the property of the racer and other land crabs, and is rather awkward in its gait, impeded probably by the enormous claws. While walking, it presents a curious aspect, being lifted nearly a foot above the ground on its two central pairs of legs, and if it be intercepted in its retreat, it brandishes its formidable weapons, clattering them loudly, and always keeping its face towards the enemy. Some travellers aver that it is capable of climbing up the stems of the palm-trees, in order to get at the fruit, and this assertion has lately been corroborated by the experience of competent observers.

The food of the Robber Crab is of a very peculiar nature, consisting chiefly, if not entirely, of the cocoa-nut. Most of my readers have seen this enormous fruit as it appears when taken from the tree, surrounded with a thick massy envelope of fibrous substance, which, when stripped from the nut itself, is employed for many useful purposes. How the creature is to feed on the kernel seems quite a mystery; and, primâ facie, for a crab to extract the cocoa-nut from its envelope, to pierce the thick and stubborn shell, and to feed upon the enclosed kernel, seems an utterly impossible task. Indeed, had not the feat been watched by credible witnesses, no one who was acquainted with the habits and powers of the crustacea would have credited such an assertion. Yet Mr. Darwin, Messrs. Tyerman and Bennett, and other observant men, have watched the habits of the creature, and all agree in their accounts.

According to Mr. Darwin, the crab seizes upon the fallen

cocoa-nuts, and with its enormous pincers tears away the outer covering, reducing it to a mass of ravelled threads. This substance is carried by the crabs into their holes, for the purpose of forming a bed whereon they can rest when they change their shells, and the Malays are in the habit of robbing the burrows of these stored fibres, which are ready picked for them, and which they use as "junk," i.e. a rough kind of oakum, which is employed for caulking the seams of vessels, making mats, and similar purposes. When the crab has freed the nut from the husk, it introduces the small end of a claw into one of the little holes which are found at one end of the cocoa-nut, and by turning the claw backwards and forwards, as if it were a bradawl, the crab contrives to scoop out the soft substance of the nut.

According to the observations of Messrs. Tyerman and Bennett, the well-known missionaries to the South Seas, the Robber Crab has another method of getting at the cocoa-nut, and displays an instinctive knowledge of political economy which is very remarkable.

"These animals live under the cocoa-nut trees, and subsist upon the fruit which they find upon the ground. With their powerful front claws they tear off the fibrous husk; afterwards, inserting one of the sharp points of the same into a hole at the end of the nut, they beat it with violence against a stone until it cracks; the shell is then easily pulled to pieces, and the precious fruit within devoured at leisure. Sometimes, by widening the hole with one of their round, gimlet claws, or enlarging the breach with their forceps, they effect sufficient entrance to enable them to scoop out the kernel, without the trouble of breaking the unwieldy nut.

"These crabs burrow in the earth, under the roots of the trees that furnish them with provisions-prudently storing up in their holes large quantities of cocoa-nuts, stripped of their husk, at those times when the fruits are most abundant, against the recurring intervals when they are scarce. We are informed that if the long and delicate antennæ of these robust creatures be touched with oil, they instantly die. They are not found on any of these islands except the small coral ones, of which they are the principal occupants. The people here account them delicious.

food."

The palm-climbing habits of the Robber Crab are mentioned