"According to popular belief among the Indians," says Cuvier, "the Robber Crab feeds on the nuts of the cocoa-tree, and it makes its excursions during the night; its places of retreat are fissures in the rocks, or holes in the ground." The accounts of the early writers and travellers, as well as of the natives, were disbelieved; but their truth has since been abundantly confirmed. MM. Quoy and Guimard assure us that several Robber Crabs were fed by them for many months on cocoa-nuts alone; and a specimen of this Crab was submitted to the Zoological Society, with additional information from Mr. Cuming, in whose fine collection from the islands of the South Pacific several specimens were preserved. Mr. Cuming states these Crabs to be found in great numbers in Lord Hood's Island, in the Pacific. He there frequently met with them on the road. On being disturbed, the Crabs instantly assumed a defensive attitude, making a loud snapping with their powerful claws, or pincers, which continued as they retreated backwards. They climb a species of palm to gather a small kind of cocoa-nut that grows thereon. They live at the roots of trees, and not in the holes of rocks; and they form a favourite food among the natives. Such is the substance of Mr. Cuming's account. Mr. Darwin, in his "Researches in Geology and Natural History," saw several of these Crabs in the Keeling Islands, or Cocos Islands, in the Indian Ocean, about 600 miles distant from the coast of Sumatra. In these islands, of coral formation, the cocoa-nut tree is so abundant as to appear, at first glance, to compose the whole wood of the islands.