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164
Glaucus; Or, The Wonders of the Shore
·
Charles Kingsley
49
And
it
is
noteworthy,
first,
that
the
defensive
thorns
which
are
permanent
on
the
two
thinner
species,
aculeatum
and
echinatum,
disappear
altogether
on
the
thicker
one,
tuberculatum,
as
old
age
gives
him
a
solid
and
heavy
globose
shell;
and
next,
that
he
too,
while
young
and
tender,
and
liable
therefore
to
be
bored
through
by
whelks
and
such
murderous
univalves,
does
actually
possess
the
same
briar-prickles,
which
his
thinner
cousins
keep
throughout
life.
Nevertheless,
prickles,
in
all
three
species,
are,
as
far
as
we
can
see,
useless
in
Torbay,
where
no
wolf-fish
(Anarrhichas
lupus)
or
other
owner
of
shell-crushing
jaws
wanders,
terrible
to
lobster
and
to
cockle.
Originally
intended,
as
we
suppose,
to
face
the
strong-toothed
monsters
of
the
Mediterranean,
these
foreigners
have
wandered
northward
to
shores
where
their
armour
is
not
now
needed;
and
yet
centuries
of
idleness
and
security
have
not
been
able
to
persuade
them
to
lay
it
by.
This—
if
my
explanation
is
the
right
one—
is
but
one
more
case
among
hundreds
in
which
peculiarities,
useful
doubtless
to
their
original
possessors,
remain,
though
now
useless,
in
their
descendants.
Just
so
does
the
tame
ram
inherit
the
now
superfluous
horns
of
his
primeval
wild
ancestors,
though
he
fights
now—
if
he
fights
at
all—
not
with
his
horns,
but
with
his
forehead.
Enough
of
Cardium
tuberculatum.
Now
for
the
other
animals
of
the
heap;
and
first,
for
those
long
white
razors.
They,
as
well
as
the
grey
scimitars,
are
Solens,
Razor-fish
(Solen
siliqua
and
S.
ensis),
burrowers
in
the
sand
by
that
foot
which
protrudes
from
one
end,
nimble
in
escaping
from
the
Torquay
boys,
whom
you
will
see
boring
for
them
with
a
long
iron
screw,
on
the
sands
at
low
tide.
They
are
very
good
to
eat,
these
razor-fish;
at
least,
for
those
who
so
think
them;
and
abound
in
millions
upon
all
our
sandy
shores.
{70}
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