rod, which follows every lunge, shortening and lengthening,
slipping and twining round every piece of gravel and stem of sea-
weed, with a tiring drag such as no Highland wrist or step could
ever bring to bear on salmon or on trout. The victim is tired now;
and slowly, and yet dexterously, his blind assailant is feeling and
shifting along his side, till he reaches one end of him; and then
the black lips expand, and slowly and surely the curved finger
begins packing him end-foremost down into the gullet, where he
sinks, inch by inch, till the swelling which marks his place is
lost among the coils, and he is probably macerated to a pulp long
before he has reached the opposite extremity of his cave of doom.
Once safe down, the black murderer slowly contracts again into a
knotted heap, and lies, like a boa with a stag inside him,
motionless and blest. (19)

There; we must come away now, for the tide is over our ankles; but
touch, before you go, one of those little red mouths which peep out
of the stone. A tiny jet of water shoots up almost into your face.

The bivalve (20) who has burrowed into the limestone knot (the
softest part of the stone to his jaws, though the hardest to your
chisel) is scandalized at having the soft mouths of his siphons so
rudely touched, and taking your finger for some bothering Annelid,
who wants to nibble him, is defending himself; shooting you, as
naturalists do humming-birds, with water. Let him rest in peace;
it will cost you ten minutes' hard work, and much dirt, to extract
him; but if you are fond of shells, secure one or two of those
beautiful pink and straw-coloured scallops (Hinnites pusio, Plate
X. fig. 1), who have gradually incorporated the layers of their
lower valve with the roughnesses of the stone, destroying thereby