shells as houses or fortresses, ready built and light enough for easy
transport, is obviously discounted by a twofold inconvenience.
There is nothing to ensure that the supply will be equal to the demand,
and Nature has not arranged that the borrowed tenement shall
continue to grow with the growth of its new tenant. To meet these
defects it is found that numerous species encourage or demand the
companionship of various zoophytes, simple or colonial. These
sometimes completely absorb the shell on which they are settled,
but then act as a substitute for it, and in any case by their outgrowth
they extend the limits of the dwelling, so that the inmate
can grow in comfort without having to hunt or fight for a larger
abode. Among the Lithodinea, or stone crabs, besides important
readjustments of classification (Bouvier, 1895, 1896), should be
noticed the evidence of their cosmopolitan range, and the species
Neolithodes agassizii (Smith) and N. grimaldii, Milne-Edwards and
Bouvier, which carry to an extreme the spinosity characteristic of
the group (fig. 1). S. I. Smith’s investigations on the early stages
of Hippa talpoida, Say, were published in 1877.
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| Fig. 1.—Neolithodes grimaldii, A. Milne-Edwards and Bouvier. |
With regard to the accessions to knowledge in the enormous group of the genuine Macrura, reference need only be made to the extensive reports in which Spence Bate, S. I. Smith, Faxon, Wood-Mason, Alcock, and others have made known the results of celebrated explorations. Various larval stages have been successfully investigated by Sars. Alcock (1901) describes from his own observation the newly hatched Phyllosoma larva of Thenus orientalis, Fabricius. An admirable discrimination of the larval and adult characters of the genus Sergestes has been given by H. J. Hansen (Proc. Zool. Soc., London, 1896). Singularity excites our wonder in Thaumastocheles zaleucus, v. Willemoes Suhm, which makes up for its vanished eyes by its extraordinarily elongate and dentated claws; in Psalidopus huxleyi, Wood-Mason and Alcock (1892), bristling with spikes from head to tail; in the Nematocarcinidae, with their long thread-like limbs and longer antennae; in species of Aristaeopsis reported by Chun from deep water off the east coast of Africa, bright red prawns nearly a foot long, with antennae about five times the length of the body. That certain species, particularly many from deep water, have disproportionately large eggs, is explained by the supposition that the young derive the advantage of being hatched in an advanced stage of development.
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| Fig. 2.—Anaspides tasmaniae, Thomson. |
3. Schizopoda.—This order of animals for the most part delicately beautiful, has for the moment five families—Lophogastridae, Eucopiidae, Euphausiidae, Mysidae and Anaspididae. In the Euphausiidae the digitiform-arborescent branchiae, as if conscious of their own extreme elegance, remain wholly uncovered. In the two preceding families they are partially covered. In the Mysidae the branchiae are wanting, and some would form this family into a separate order, Mysidacea. In Anaspides, a peculiar fresh-water genus discovered in 1892 by G. M. Thomson on Mount Wellington, in Tasmania, the gills are not arborescent, and there are seven segments of the trunk free of the carapace (fig. 2). A membranaceous carapace separates the Eucopiidae from the more solidly invested Lophogastridae. Among many papers that the student will find it necessary to consult may be mentioned the “Challenger” Report on Schizopoda, by Sars, 1885, dealing with the order at large; “British Schizopoda,” by Norman Ann. Nat. Hist. (1892); “Decapoden und Schizopoden,” Plankton-Expedition (Ortmann, 1893); “Euphausiidae,” by Stebbing, Proc. Zool. Soc. (London, 1900); Mysidae of the Russian Empire, by Czerniavski (1882–1883); and Mysidae of the Caspian, by Sars (1893–1895–1897).
4. Stomatopoda.—This order, at one time a medley of heterogeneous forms, is now confined to the singularly compact group of the Squillidae. Here the articulation of the ocular segment is unusually distinct, and here two characters quite foreign to all the preceding groups come into view. The second maxillipeds are developed into powerful prehensile organs, and the branchiae, instead of being connected with the appendages of head and trunk, are developed on the pleopods, appendages of the abdomen. At least three segments of the trunk are left uncovered by the carapace. The developing eggs are not carried about by the mother, but deposited in her subaqueous burrow, “where they are aerated by the currents of water produced by the abdominal feet of the parent.” An excellent synopsis of the genera and species is provided by R. P. Bigelow (Proc. U.S. Mus. vol. xvii., 1894). For the habits and peculiarities of these and many other Crustaceans, A. E. Verrill and S. I. Smith on the Invertebrates of Vineyard Sound should be consulted (1874). The general subject has been illuminated by the labours of Claus, Miers, Brooks (”Challenger” Report, 1886), and the latest word on the relationship between the various larvae and their respective genera has been spoken by H. J. Hansen (Plankton-Expedition Report, 1895). The striking forms of Alima and Erichthus, at one time regarded as distinct genera, are now with more or less certainty affiliated to their several squillid parents.
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| Fig. 3.—Pseudocuma pectinatum, Sowinsky. |
5. Sympoda.—This order of sessile-eyed decapods was absolutely unknown to science till 1779. A species certainly belonging to it was described by Lepekhin in 1780, but the obscure Gammarus esca, “food Gammarus” beloved of herrings, described by J. C. Fabricius in the preceding year, may also be one of its members. Nutritious possibilities are implied in Diastylis rathkii, Kröyer, one of the largest forms, which, though slender and rarely an inch long, in its favourite Arctic waters is found “in incalculable masses, in thousands of specimens” (Stuxberg, 1880). Far on in the 19th century eminent naturalists were still debating whether in this group there were eyes or no eyes, whether the eyes were stalked or sessile, whether the animals observed were larval or adult. The American T. Say in 1818 gave a good description of a new species and founded the premier genus Diastylis, but other investigators derived little credit from the subject till more than sixty years after its introduction by the Russian Lepekhin. Then Goodsir, Kröyer, Lilljeborg, Spence Bate and one or two others made considerable advances, and in 1865 a memorable paper by G. O. Sars led the way to the great series of researches which he has continued to the present day. The name Cumacea, however, which he uses cannot be retained, being founded on the preoccupied name Cuma (Milne-Edwards, 1828). The more recent name Sympoda (see Willey, Results, pt. v. p. 609, 1900) alludes to the huddling together of the legs, which is conspicuous in most of the species. Ten families are now distinguished—Diastylidae, Lampropidae, Platyaspidae, Pseudocumidae, all with an articulated telson; without one, the Bodotriidae (formerly called Cumidae), Vaunthompsoniidae, Leuconidae, Nannastacidae, Campylaspidae, Procampylaspidae. All the Leuconidae and Procampylaspidae are blind, and some species in most of the other families. Usually the sides of the carapace are strangely produced into a mock rostrum in front of the ocular lobe, be it oculiferous or not. The last four or five segments of the trunk are free from the carapace. The slender pleon has always six distinct segments, the sixth carrying two-branched uropods, the preceding five armed with no pleopods in the female, whereas in the male the number of pairs varies from five to none. The resemblance of these creatures to miniature Macrura is alluded to in the generic name Nannastacus, meaning dwarf-lobster. In this genus alone of the known Sympoda the eyes sometimes form a pair, in accordance with the custom of all other malacostracan orders except this and of this order itself in the embryo (Sars, 1900). The most but not the only remarkable character lies in the first maxillipeds. These, with the main stem more or less pediform, have the epipod and exopod modified for respiratory purposes. The backward-directed epipods usually carry branchial vesicles. The forward-directed exopods either act as valves or form a tube (rarely two tubes), protensile and retractile, for regulating egress of water from the branchial regions. This mechanism as a whole is unique, although, as Sars observes, the epipod of the first maxillipeds has a respiratory function also in the Lophogastridae and Mysidae and in the cheliferous isopods. As a rule armature of
