M.D. Henry Lee

“ Hideous and instant is the change in his condition—five leagues of sea, instead of one mile, between him and the main! To swim that distance is impossible; he can never reach the land. Death from cold and hunger stare him in the face. His 75,000 francs will not here purchase him a crust of bread. His only hope now lies in his being seen by some passing ship, and eagerly he looks to seaward. A sail appears—approaches—the vessel is a cutter. But those on board will never see him where he stands. If he can but reach the rock he will no doubt be perceived. There is not a minute to lose ”

“ His cousin the cuttle-fish (Sepia) has an eye, round like that of an owl, which stares you out of countenance, and puzzles you by its immobility; the pupil of the eye of an octopus is like that of a tiger turned half round. The perpendicularly-elongated pupil of the cat gleams with hot ferocity: the calm, cunning gaze of the octopus from out the narrow horizontal slit of its compressed eyelids freezes by its cold cruelty. ”

“ Under a low power a young octopus was seen moving freely in the fluid contained in each transparent granule, the bright orange-brown colour in the pigment cells of its skin flashing, dying out, and re-appearing in another place, like sparks in tinder. And I was astonished to see that the little creature within the unbroken membrane was already endowed with the power of assimilating its colour to that of its surroundings. ”

“ I had always expressed very decidedly my opinion, derived from previous experiments on the eggs of the cuttle-fish and squid (Sepia and Loligo) that, the ova once impregnated, no incubation by the parent is required or takes place in a sense equivalent to that of a fowl developing a chick by the warmth of its body; but that her unremitting [61] attention to them is solely for the purpose of protecting them from injury, keeping them free from animal and vegetable parasites, and preventing their being devoured by fishes, or members of her own tribe—possibly by their own father. ”

“ If he had grasped it firmly round the neck it would have instantly let go its hold. Aristotle was well aware of this, and it may be well for bathers to remember it.
I have frequently allowed an octopus to fix itself upon, and crawl over, my bare arm. It can always be detached in this manner. None have ever attempted to bite me. But although it is “nothing when you are used to it,” it is not pleasant to have a stranger, of whose proclivities you know nothing, fasten himself upon you with such demonstration of attachment. ”

“ It sees and avoids every obstacle, and if you take it out of the water, in your hand, the precocious little creature, not a minute old, and not sufficiently matured to leave the egg naturally, will spurt its ink all over your fingers. You may tame an old cuttle-fish, and it will learn to know that you are a friend, and intend to do it no harm; but the youngsters are as shy as human babies, and regard every one but their mother as an enemy.
The preference for the light, which I described as exhibited by the young octopus, appears to be common also to the young squid and cuttle-fish. ”

“ The fishermen fasten the end of a line round a living female octopus or sepia, and lower her down towards a rocky bottom. On the male coming to woo he comes to woe, for both are pulled up together.
There is nothing incredible in this. The Japanese, at the present day, use a spawning female fish as a lure for others of the same species. Having found one nearly, but not quite, ready to deposit her roe, they squeeze from her a portion of it, which hangs suspended from the body, and then anchor her near the shore by a hook and line. ”

“ Has taught the fish by tedious wants opprest
Life to preserve and be himself the feast.
The fact is, that the larger predatory fishes regard an octopus as very acceptable food, and there is no better bait for many of them than a portion of one of its arms. Some of the cetacea also are very fond of them, and whalers have often reported that when a “fish” (as they call it) is struck it disgorges the contents of its stomach, amongst which they have noticed parts of the arms of cuttle-fishes which, judging from the size of their limbs, must have been very large specimens. ”

“ He scrambles and shuffles away, and makes the best use he can of the jury-rigging he has fitted on to his old stumps. As he does so, his keen eyes, mounted on little hillocks, peer furtively around him; and while he sidles off from his too admiring persecutors, he casts a doubtful, half-frightened, half-defiant glance behind him, like a schoolboy, timid in the dark, who fancies a ghost is following him. ”

“ Their shells were soon broken and torn apart by her powerful beak, and when she had devoured the contents the hard débris was cast out of her den.
But although the old naturalist of Stageira was mistaken in supposing that the female octopus does not take food during the period of the development of her ova, he was right in believing that her anxiety for her progeny, and her unremitting care of them, tell injuriously upon her health. A brooding octopus shows signs of diminished bodily vigour, as a sitting hen bird loses flesh whilst hatching her eggs. Her respiration at times becomes laboured. ”