It is most interesting to watch a dense mass of living cirripedes so closely packed together that not a speck of the surface of the wood is left uncovered by them; their fleshy stalks overhanging each other, and often attached in clusters to those of some larger individuals; their plumose casting-nets ever gathering in the food that comes within their reach, and carrying towards the mouth any solid particles suitable for their sustenance. How much of insoluble matter barnacles will eliminate from the water is shown by the rapidity with which they will render turbid sea water clear and transparent. The most common species of these "necked barnacles" bears the name of "_Lepas anatifera_," "the duck-bearing _Lepas_." It was so entitled by Linnaeus, in recognition of its having been connected with the fable, which, of course, met with no credit from him. Fig. 39 represents the figure-head of a ship, partly covered with barnacles, which was picked up about thirty miles off Lowestoft on the 22nd of October, 1857. It was described in the _Illustrated London News_, and the proprietors of that paper have kindly given me a copy of the block from which its portrait was printed. [Illustration: FIG. 39.--A SHIP'S FIGURE-HEAD WITH BARNACLES ATTACHED TO IT.] Others of the barnacles affix themselves to the bottoms of ships, or parasitically upon whales and sharks, and those of the latter kind often burrow deeply into the skin of their host. Fig. 40 is a portrait of a _Coronula diadema_ taken from the nose of a whale stranded at Kintradwell, in the north of Scotland, in 1866, and sent to the late Mr. Frank Buckland. Growing on this _Coronula_ are three of the curious eared barnacles, _Conchoderma aurita_; the _Lepas aurita_ of Linnaeus. The species of the whale from which these Barnacles were taken was not mentioned, but it was probably the "hunch-backed" whale, _Megaptera longimana_, which is generally infested with this _Coronula_. This very illustrative specimen was, and I hope still is, in Mr. Buckland's Museum at South Kensington. It was described by him in _Land and Water_, of May 19th, 1866, and I am indebted to the proprietors of that paper for the accompanying portrait of it. [Illustration: FIG. 40.--WHALE BARNACLE (_Coronula diadema_), WITH THREE _Conchoderma aurita_ ATTACHED TO IT.] [Illustration: FIG. 41.--A YOUNG BARNACLE. (_Larva of Chthamalus stellatus._)]