At many spots on our coast (_e.g._ Sandown, in the Isle of Wight, and the Channel Islands) rapid digging in the sand at the lowest tides will result in the capture of sand-eels, a bigger and a smaller kind, from 1 foot to 6 inches in length. These are eel-shaped, silvery fish, which swim near the shore, but burrow into the soft sand as the tide recedes. They are excellent eating. We used at Sandown to make up a party of young people to dig the smaller "sand-eels," or "sand-launce." The agility and rapid disappearance of the burrowing fish into the sand when one thought one had safely dug them out, rendered the pursuit difficult and exciting. Then a wood fire on the beach, a frying-pan, fat, flour, and salt were brought into operation, and the sand-eels were cooked to perfection and eaten. [Illustration: FIG. 5.--The shell of the Heart-urchin (Spatangus purpureus) with its spines rubbed off. One-fourth the actual diameter.] Some of the marks or small heaps of sand on the flats exposed at low tide are characteristic of certain shell-fish. The "razor-fish" (Fig. 19, b)--a very much elongated clam, or mussel, with astonishing powers of rapid burrowing--leaves a hole on the surface like a keyhole, about an inch long. It can be dug up by an energetic spadesman, but a spoonful of common salt poured over the opening of its burrow will cause it to suddenly shoot out on to the surface, when it may be picked up, and the hunter spared any violent exertion. The curious heart-urchin (Fig. 5), as fragile as an egg-shell, and covered with long, closely-set spines like a brush, is often to be found burrowing in the sand, as well as the transparent, pink-coloured worm known as Synapta, in the skin of which are set thousands of minute calcareous anchors hinged to little sculptured plates. These burrowers swallow the sand and extract nutriment from stray organic particles mixed in it.