Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1894-06-13
tests are simple and etticac1ous, and are !n daily use.-Pall Mall Gazette.
CONCERNING CRABS.

CONCERNING CRABS. An Interesting Chapter on the Habits Of
 the Queer Creatures.
 Crabs can see but cannot hear; crabs can remember and can communicate; crabs are sensitive to any vibration of the ground; crabs are inquisitive; crabs are docile and crabs can smell
 Eight months of constant association with crabs, eight months in which many leisure and lonely hours were oe- eupied in watching and studying crabs, gave five men who lived on Chipperton Island for that period of time the op- portunity to get on friendly, even ia miliar, relations with the red crabs that infest by millions that strange equatorial coral isle. They were the employees of phosphate company, and were preparing the cargo of schooner i'll which they returned recently from the island They made the following observations: The crab can see, but he is near-sighted. At distance of twenty-five feet he can observe d man walking along the beach, but at that distance he cannot see distinctly, for he ambles after the man to satisfy his enormous curiosity He cannot hear Shouts or other noises, even close by the crab, have not the slightest effect upon him. He pursues his even side way, inconsiderate alike of the harsh guffaw or the rich song of the mans voice Yet of movement of foot on the sand, of the merest touch on the ground, he has knowledge immediately and proceeds to explore the cause of the vibration of his territory. A little water poured from bucket upon the sand is sufficient to call convention of crabs from circuit of many feet. The explanation is that the crab is exceed ingly sensitive to the merest vibration of the ground from unaocustomed cause.
 The crab is more curious than any woman One of the men stuck stake upright on the beach. At least one of every twelve of the crabs which passed l that way laboriously climbed that stake to the top and then awkwardly wriggled down the other side. When the men were building their houses from the lumber they carried thither by schooner, the crabs crawled up the sides in such numbers that they had to be swept ] away so that the men could work. A derrick twenty-six feet high was erected for use in the occupation in which the men were engaged. The morning after i it was raised, the men found four in auisitive crabs on the top bar seeing what they could see
 Crabs can smell A piece of meat was placed on the ground. The crabs or the leeward side for a long distance gathered to feast, while the crabs even those close to the meat, on tht windward side, gave no attention to ths banquet and continued their march ir uninterrupted solemnity.
 The crowning achievement in tht course of observation of crab life in 2 crab dominion is the discovery that crabs remember and communicate These conclusions came from the exper fences of the men in keeping the erab' from intrudinQ upon the privacy of th' dwellings they built upon the fiat ant treeless plain. When they began theil work they were harassed almost to deati by the inquisitive shellfsh. After thu cabins were finished the crabs, unin V1GeQ, edIHe III UO luSpeCt Wiiab W ns NoAle
 To keep them out, the doors wer' kept constantly closed, and sheets 0 tin were nailed along the threshold Then system of regular instruction O the crab in the way he should go be gan. Boards were placed around tn houses and every time a crab set clay in a board he was swept off by broom in this education broom was worI out. but the crabs were taught. Afte daily, hourly, minutely sweeping 0 crabs from the boards, the crabs cease' altogether tsseir incursions upon tn ] nIanks If a board were laid down ol the sand, no crab would even touch it Therefore the men say the crabs cal remember. Therefore they say tha crabs can communicate. It is a physi cal impossibility that every crab on tn , island should have been swept off thos ,, boards, yet no crab wiggled- his way Q them after the system of severe educa : tian vas fully accomplished. Therefor the swept crabs must have informe the unswept crabs that boards Wer not healthful places for them to visi1 s How else could they know that board were not for their prornenadea ~sa Z Francisco Examiner.