"It's an echinoderm," he said, "generally with five arms, that lives only in the sea, has a simple stomach, and feeds on the minute organisms in the water."
"There you're wrong," said the director. "It lives only in the sea, that's right enough, but you haven't proper regard for a starfish's powers of digestion. It feeds on mussels, oysters and other shellfish. Can it swim?"
"I don't think so, sir," said Colin, after a moment's thought, "it crawls."
"How?"
"I don't know, Mr. Prelatt."
"By thousands of sucker-like feet on the under side of it," he was told. "So you see it can crawl to and over an oyster-bed."
"But even so, wouldn't an oyster shut tight at the approach of danger?" suggested Colin.
"That doesn't make any difference to the starfish," was the reply, "he'll open the oyster."
"How, sir?"