saw one in the botanic garden of the last-named town,
flitting about a flowering bush of the Provence rose.

_Ink of the Cuttle-fish._--[By way of _addenda_ if not _corrigenda_ to
our description of the Cuttle-fish, at page 104 of the present volume,
we quote the following observations.]

"When in danger, cuttle-fish are said to eject a copious black liquor
through their funnel or excrementary canal, as a means of obscuring the
circumfluent water, and concealing themselves from all foes:--

"Long as the craftie cuttle lieth sure
In the blacke cloud of his thicke vomiture."[15]

This inky fluid is a very remarkable secretion, produced in a bag
that lies near the liver, and sometimes even embosomed in it, and
communicating with the funnel by means of its own excretory duct. The
interior of the bag is not a simple cavity; it is filled with a soft
cellular or spongy substance in which the ink is diffused. This has no
relation or analogy with bile, as Munro believed; but it is a peculiar
secretion, somewhat glutinous, readily miscible with water, and variable
in point of shade, according to the species of cephalopode from which it
comes; so that, as Dr. Grant remarks, a more intimate acquaintance with
this character might be useful in tracing relations among the different
species. The colour of the ink in Loligo sagittata[16] is a deep brown,
approaching to yellowish brown when much diluted, and corresponds
remarkably with the coloured spots on the skin of that species; but
in Octopus ventricosus the colour of the ink is pure black, and it is
blackish grey when diluted on paper. "The ink (_Edin. Phil. Journ._ vol.
xvi. p. 316.) brought in a solid state from China has the same pure
black colour as in the Octopus ventricosus, and differs entirely in its
shade, when diluted, from that of the Loligo sagittata, as may be seen
from specimens of these three colours on drawing paper. Swammerdam
suspected the China ink to be made from that of the Sepia; Cuvier found
it more like that of the Octopus and Loligo; but different kinds of that
substance are brought from China, probably made from different genera of
these animals, where they abound of gigantic size." At the present day,
according to Cuvier, an ink is prepared from the liquor of these animals
in Italy, which differs from the genuine China ink only in being a
little less black. (_Mem._, vol. i. p. 4.) Davy found it to be "a
carbonaceous substance mixed with gelatine