90 NATURAL HISTORY OF AMIA CALVA LINNAEUS. 



The swarm movement became more like that of Amoeba verrucosa, whereas hitherto 

 it had resembled the movement of an Amoeba proteus with very short pseudopods. 

 After about fifteen minutes the male was seen returning. His inward course was 

 tortuous on account of the hummocks, and in passing between them he frequently, 

 in slipping over shallow places, arched up his back until his dorsal fin was out of 

 water. He made several attempts to reach the swarm, trying first toward the 

 right and then toward the left, but finally coming directly in. He came to within 

 a foot of the swarm and then, apparently without having noted me and certainly 

 without being frightened, he turned slowly and deliberately and retraced his course, 

 going out by the identical route by which he had entered. The swarm of larvae 

 now gradually made its way out by the same route. This was not accomplished 

 directly, but after much circling and many trials in different directions and very 

 slowly. The larvae moved as though there were one main channel of exit with 

 many side passages ending blindly. In two swarms they seemed to follow out these 

 side passages until balked and then to return always to the main passage and 

 continue outward. In this way they worked their way out over the course taken 

 by the male to a distance of eight metres from the nest. The male meanwhile 

 had for a second time taken fright. When the swarm was last seen there were 

 many stragglers. Indeed some stragglers were left along its whole course. I 

 watched for an hour and did not see the swarm reunited. The movements of the 

 larvae became during this time continuously more definitely progressive, and when I 

 finally left them after about an hour and a half the individuals of the fractional 

 swarms were progressing like those of a school of fish." (Note-book.) The 

 swarms had become schools. 



As I approached nest 12 (1901) about three o'clock in the afternoon and when 

 I was within three metres of this nest the "green-spot" male, after swimming 

 about, took up a position about half-way between me and the nest. "Then I saw 

 the larva? coming toward him from the nest in a long straggling column and appar- 

 ently following his trail. When they reached him they at once formed a flat cir- 

 cular swarm which remained beneath him and moved with him very slowly to a 

 distance of five metres from the nest. The swarm was usually in the shadow of 

 the male's body, and as it moved it rotated. The male kept usually over it, turning, 

 however, in one direction and another. His pectoral and caudal fins frequently 

 brushed parts of the swarm violently aside." (Note-book.) These larvae were 

 12.5 millimetres long. 



In thus moving out from the nest the larvae do not merely pass toward deeper 

 water, since in the case of nest 13, which was situated among hummocks, the water 



