But, like many other popular fictions, this notion was founded on truth, and probably originated in mistaking the fleshy peduncle of the barnacle (Lepas analifera) for the neck of a goose, the shell for its head, and the tentacula for a tuft of feather.

" The little boy brought a large saucer, round which the crimson sea-flowers were waving their long tentacula in the salt water.

Dr. Johnson, to be sure, commends the habit of "browsing" in libraries; and this will do very well for those whose memory clinches, like the tentacula of zoöphytes, around every particle of nourishment that comes within its reach.