Besides the islands which we have cited, there are some small rocks, having sufficient soil upon them to afford a gleam of animal and vegetable life, but which are rarely if ever trodden by the foot of man. Sometimes the hardy fishermen spread their nets from the most available; but this work is generally pursued from boats and at points further from land. There are certain species of shell-fish, including the patella, lobsters, and crabs, which so abound on the circumscribed shore of anvil-shaped Filfla, that fishermen come hither regularly to obtain them. The phosphorescent jelly-fish, that glow-worm of the sea, lies upon the surface near the shore in shoals, with here and there a blue and rose-tinted starfish. The stormy petrel, the manx, and the white sea-gulls build their nests amid the rocks of Filfla. The gathering of coral was formerly a successful business hereabouts, but it is now abandoned as not being sufficiently profitable. Oysters are also found near the shore, and form a considerable source of food supply for the common people; but the Mediterranean oyster does not recommend itself to one accustomed to the superior product in the same line found on the American coast. This bivalve of the narrow sea is often transported in considerable quantities inland to Rome, where it does not always prove harmless to strangers, though the digestive organs of the natives seem quite able to grapple with it. The author was once seriously poisoned by eating "oysters on the shell," at Nazzari's famous restaurant, near the corner of the Via Condotti, in Rome.