soldier-crab

Even the soldier-crab must have some likeness to the snail of whose house he takes possession, else he could not live in it at all.

Adela Cathcart, Volume 2 George MacDonald 1864

Occasionally, I unhoused a "soldier-crab," who had taken up free quarters in some unoccupied cone, and became so delighted with its shelter as never to move without dragging it at his heels along the sand.

Journal of an African Cruiser Horatio Bridge 1849

We naturally thought that the shells were empty; but as we watched them, thousands of them began to move, each tenanted by a soldier-crab, and a whole army of them slowly advanced out of the sea and marched across the land, devouring all the insects they encountered in their progress.

A Voyage round the World A book for boys William Henry Giles Kingston 1847

BUCKIE-INGRAM, _s. _ the soldier-crab, _Cancer bernardus_, which always inhabits the shells of other animals.

Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume XXIV. Alexander Leighton 1837

J-----, the other day, was describing a soldier-crab to his mother, he being much interested in natural history, and endeavoring to give as strong an idea as possible of its warlike characteristics, and power to harm those who molest it.

Passages from the English Notebooks, Volume 1. Nathaniel Hawthorne 1834

J-----, the other day, was describing a soldier-crab to his mother, he being much interested in natural history, and endeavoring to give as strong an idea as possible of its warlike characteristics, and power to harm those who molest it.

Passages from the English Notebooks, Complete Nathaniel Hawthorne 1834