A singular species of Ophiuran, known among fishermen as the "Basket-fish," (Fig. 151,) is to be found in Massachusetts Bay. Its arms are very long in comparison to the size of the disk, and divide into a vast number of branches. In moving, the animal lifts itself on the extreme end of these branches, standing as it were on tiptoe (Fig. 151), so that the ramifications of the arms form a kind of trellis-work all around it, reaching to the ground, while the disk forms a roof. In this living house with latticed walls small fishes and other animals are occasionally seen to take shelter; but woe to the little shrimp or fish who seeks a refuge there, if he be of such a size as to offer his host a tempting mouthful; he will fare as did the fly who accepted the invitation of the spider. These animals are exceedingly voracious, and sometimes, in their greediness for food, entangle themselves in fishing lines or nets. When disturbed, they coil their arms closely around the mouth, assuming at such times a kind of basket-shape, from which they derive their name. This Basket-fish is honorably connected with our early colonial history, being thought worthy, by no less a personage than John Winthrop, Governor of Connecticut, who, as he says, "had never seen the like," to be sent with "other natural curiosities of these parts" to the Royal Society of London, in 1670. He accompanies the specimen with a minute description, omitting "other particulars, that we may reflect a little upon this elaborate piece of nature." His account is as graphic as it is accurate, and we can hardly give a better idea of the animal than by extracting some portions of it. "This Fish," he says, "spreads itself from a Pentagonal Root, which incompasseth the Mouth (being in the middle), into 5 main Limbs or branches, each of which, just at issuing out from the Body, subdivides itself into two, and each of these 10 branches do again divide into two parts, making 20 lesser branches; each of which again divide into two smaller branches, making in all 40. These again into 80, and these into 160; and these into 320; these into 640; into 1280; into 2560; into 5120; into 10,240; into 20,480; into 40,960; into 81,920; beyond which the further expanding of the Fish could not be certainly trac'd";--a statement which we readily believe, wondering only at the patience which followed this labyrinth so far. [Illustration: Fig. 151. Astrophyton, Basket-fish; in a natural attitude.]