THE KING-CRAB.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4217, 25 September 1874, Page 3

THE KING-CRAB.

]\lr, Henry Lee, writing aboxxt the kixxg-crah, says ;—“ As some of my readers may wish to know something of the appearance of this animal, I will try to describe it. In genex-al shape and color it is not unlike a sting-ray-of equal size, the shell being about ten inches in diameter and the tail about the same ' length. But, as evex-yone has not seen a X will compare it to a more familiar object. Take a plumber’s ladle, in which be melts his lead or solder, shorten its handle by one-half, and file down the remainder, so that it tapex-s from the boxvl to a sharp point at the top. Turn over the ladle, as if you were emptying it of the lead, and let it lie on the floor, with the bottom of the bowl upward, and you will Ixave something vex-y like a Jjimv.lus. The bowl roughly represents the shell, or bucklex-, and the shax-pened handle the tail. In the hollow of the bowl are the body and limbs of tbe crab, which I will not now. describe in detail. When the creature walks on the bottom of the taxxk, its legs are so completely covered by the boxvl-slxapcd shield, that if you look down upon it from above they are not seen, and it presents the appearance of the ladle moving along, bowl first, with the handle trailing astern without any visible means of locomotion. The buclclor is divided into two portions, at some distance behind the centre, and the tail has a flexible joint at the junction with the body, so that the cx-ab can bend the after portion x-ather more than to a right angle with the fore buckler. When it wishes to burrow in the soft ground, it thrasts tbe point of its tail downwards, and thxxs elevates the hinder part of its body, and drives the front plate into the sand or mud. If, by slipping from a rock up which lie lias climbed, or by any other accident, it falls on its hack, the tail is similarly used as a lever, by means of which it regains its proper position. The eyes are very remarkable ; there are two large oval ones, wide apart, and very slightly raised convexly above the buckler, one on each side, like bull’s-eye lights in tho upper deck armour of an ironclad monitor ship. These keep watch obliquely on ■the port and starboard bow, and are compound and divided into a considerable number of small facets, like those of other Crustacea. In addition to these, two very small simple eyes are set close together, almost in contact, on the medial line of tho buckler, and look out straight ahead. From these the crab takes its specific name, Polyphemus, in allusion to the Sicilian King of the Cyclops, whose one eye, in the middle of his forehead, was put out by a fix-ebrand by Ulysses, when ho had succeeded (like "old Mr. Weller’s coaching friends with the Deputy-Shepherd Brother Stiggina) iu making the monster drink to helpless excess.