CRUSTACEANS phoses are undergone by Crustacea between the egg and the adult con- dition. Then it was that the common shore crab became of service just because of its commonness and the intrepidity which made it so very easy to catch. Moreover the tenacity of Hfe which the parent exhibits was found to be so far inherited by the offspring that they could with comparative facility be reared in an aquarium. Accordingly it was soon proved that here at least very remarkable changes of form are undergone in the juvenile period. Adam White refers this species to ' British coast, everywhere,' and also states that the British Museum possesses a variety from Brighton, presented by Mr. W. Wing.^ It is also recorded as very common in the special district of Sussex explored by the observers to whom we are indebted for the Natural History of Hastings and St. heonards and the Vicinity. ^ In regard to the valuable catalogues contained in this work and its three supplements, the Rev. E. N. Bloomfield of Guestling Rectory, Hastings, has kindly informed me that the lists of Crustacea in the first issue and the first supplement may be attributed to Mr. E. A. Butler, the Entomostraca of the second supplement to Mr. H. Langdon, and the few additions in the third supplement to Mr. P. Rufford. For the nomenclature of the stalk- eyed crustaceans these authorities adopted the names used by Bell, which are by no means remarkable for conforming to the rules of priority, although, as we shall later have occasion to notice, the principle of those rules was accepted by Bell himself. The coastline included in the Hastings district may be described as extending from Rye to Bexhill; and the introduction to the Natural History explains that cliffs of the Wealden formation, rising sometimes to a height of nearly 300 feet, form this line from Cliff End, Fairlight, to St. Leonards, and from Bulverhythe to Bexhill, the remainder being occupied by marsh land which contains in many places comparatively recent marine deposits and remains of a submarine forest. ' A few miles to the south-east of Hast- ings there is a Shoal known as the " Diamond " ; it is much frequented by fishermen and forms an excellent hunting ground for the Naturalist.'^ The authors add that many of the marine animals in their lists have been found only on this shoal, but without indicating which these are. Portumnus latipes (Pennant) is recorded as common in the Hastings district* under the name P. variegatus given it by Leach and Bell. Both those authors expressly recognize that Pennant had much earlier called it latipes. This name of ' broadfoot ' it owes to the flattened middle joints of its ambulatory legs and the rather broadly lanceolate form of the terminal joints in the last pair. Leach, who speaks of it as one of the most beautiful of our malacostracous animals,'* may have called it ' variegated ' for two reasons, being partly influenced by its pale purplish white colour mottled with a darker hue, and partly by the descriptive title. Cancer latipes variegatus, used by Plancus.* But that 1 List Brit. Mus. p. 12. * Nat. Hist. Hastings (1878), p. 41. ' Loc. cit. p. 4.
- Loc. cit. p. 41. 6 Malacostraca Podophthalmata Britannia; pt. 2 (181 5), text topi. 4.
® De Conchis minus notis (1739, ed. 2, 1760), p. 34. 247
