GREY MULLET. 237 



shorter course, and throw itself over the head-line, and so 

 escape ; and when one of the company passes, all immediate- 

 ly follow/ 1 



" This disposition is so innate in the Grey Mullet, that 

 young ones of minute size may be seen tumbling themselves 

 head over tail in their active exertions to pass the head-line. 

 I have even known a Mullet less than an inch in length to 



O 



throw itself repeatedly over the side of a cup in which the 

 water was an inch below the brim." 



" Mullets frequently enter by the floodgate into a salt- 

 water mill-pool at Looe, which contains about twenty acres ; 

 and the larger ones, having looked about for a turn or two, 

 often return by the way they had come. When, however, 

 the return of the tide has closed the gates, and prevented 

 this, though the space within is sufficiently large for pleasure 

 and safety, the idea of constraint and danger sets them on 

 effecting their deliverance. The wall is examined in every 

 part ; and when the water is near the summit, efforts are 

 made to throw themselves over, by which they are not un- 

 commonly left on the bank to their own destruction." 



" When, after being surrounded by a net, two or three 

 have made their escape, and the margin of the net has been 

 secured and elevated above the surface, to render certain the 

 capture of the only remaining one, I have seen the anxious 

 prisoner pass from end to end, examine every mesh and all 

 the folds that lay on the ground, and at last, concluding that 

 to pass through a mesh, or rend it, afforded the only though 

 desperate chance of escape, it has retired to the greatest pos- 

 sible distance, which had not been done before, and rushed at 

 once to that part which was most tightly stretched. It was 

 held, however, by the middle ; and conscious that all further 

 effort must be unavailing, it yielded without a further strug- 

 gle to its fate." 



" The Grey Mullet selects food that is soft and fat, or 



