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Updated: May 21, 2025
If I had worked my way from a sponge instead of a lobster, I should have found it associated, by like ties, with a great number of other animals into the sub-kingdom Protozoa; if I had selected a fresh-water polype or a coral, the members of what naturalists term the sub-kingdom Coelenterata, would have grouped themselves around my type; had a snail been chosen, the inhabitants of all univalve and bivalve, land and water, shells, the lamp shells, the squids, and the sea-mat would have gradually linked themselves on to it as members of the same sub-kingdom of Mollusca; and finally, starting from man, I should have been compelled to admit first, the ape, the rat, the horse, the dog, into the same class; and then the bird, the crocodile, the turtle, the frog, and the fish, into the same sub-kingdom of Vertebrata.
The animal carried an ink sac, and no doubt used it as that of the modern cuttlefish is used, to darken the water and make easy an escape from foes. Belemnites have sometimes been sketched with fossil sepia, or india ink, from their own ink sacs. In the belemnites and their descendants, the squids and cuttlefish, the cephalopods made the radical change from external to the internal shell.
In such tracts of the ocean are found the lower marine animals, in incalculable numbers; the floating shell-fish, as Janthina, Hyalaea and Cleodora; the sea-lizards, as Velellae, Porpitae, and their kindred; the squids, and other molluscs; with myriads of medusa.
The shell of Nautilus is external, that of Spirula internal; Nautilus has four gills, Spirula two; Nautilus has multitudinous tentacles, Spirula has only ten arms beset with horny-rimmed suckers; Spirula, like the squids and cuttle-fishes, which it closely resembles, has a bag of ink which it squirts out to cover its retreat when alarmed; Nautilus has none.
Why, I'd never hearn on 'em, and Josiah hadn't either, though he acted dretful knowin', and put on a face of extreme enjoyment and appreciation. And he sez, "How a man duz enjoy seein' such things that he's ust to and knows all about!" And I sez, "What do you do with squids, anyway, or gaffs, or snells?" "Why," sez he, "I should snell with 'em, and gaff, and squid. What do you spoze?"
I saw something like it at Hong Kong when I went up the mountain in the railway. In Naples there is a magnificent arcade. And the shops!! The shops make me quite giddy. What brilliance! You, Masha, and you, Lika, would be rabid with delight. There is a wonderful aquarium in Naples. There are even sharks and squids.
Among the mollusks, the most important change is in the creation of the great, strong swimming squids, the most remarkable creatures of the sea. Some of these have arms that can stretch for fifty feet from tip to tip.
Instead of grappling-irons, they used huge captive squids, which they swung out on to the hostile island; these grappled the wood and so held the island fast. Their missiles, effective enough, were oysters the size of waggons, and sponges which might cover an acre.
A skin corresponding to the mantle envelops the body, and the gills are on either side of it; the stomach with its winding canal, the liver, and heart occupy the centre of the body, as in the two other classes. This class includes all the Cuttle-Fishes, Squids, and Nautili, and has a vast number of fossil representatives.
"A covey of flying-fish would have been more acceptable," observed the doctor, as he again composed himself to rest; "but they are not to be found in these latitudes." Two or three people, awakened by the doctor's voice, inquired what was the matter. "Only a few squids come on board to be cooked for breakfast," answered Willy.
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