838 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



observed by competent naturalists in Cornwall and tbe Orkneys. This 

 salt-water descendant of the little river tittlebat grows, as might nat- 

 urally be expected, to a larger size in his more spacious environment, 

 and reaches the dimensions of an average trout. He never ascends 

 rivers, even to spawn, but weaves his nest of sea-weed or corralline 

 under some overhanging ledge, and guards his bright, amber-colored 

 eggs with the same jealous care as his fresh-water relations. His per- 

 sonal appearance is chiefly remarkable for the very elongated form 

 which procures him the name of adder, as well as for the prolonged 

 snout, not unlike a gar-fish, and the rows of shields that protect his side 

 with a perfect coat of sheeny sheet-armor. That admirable observer, 

 Mr. Richard Couch, of Mevagissey, to whom, with Mr. Jonathan 

 Couch, we owe most of our knowledge of marine fish-life, was the first 

 to watch his manner of nesting. He found that the marine stickleback 

 built its home in shallow water, where the bottom was thickly covered 

 with sea-wrack, and that it bound the materials together with an elas- 

 tic thread, resembling silk, which hardens by exposure to water, but 

 the mode of whose secretion has not yet been determined. Mr. Couch 

 visited one of the nests every day for three weeks, and saw the parent 

 stickleback invariably mounting guard over it with military precision. 

 When he ventured to disturb part of the materials, the fish immedi- 

 ately set about repairing the damage, by drawing together the sides 

 of the opening, so as to conceal once more the eggs which the too 

 curious naturalist had exposed to view. Stickleback will tolerate no 

 eaves-dropping intrusion into the sacred privacy of domestic life. So- 

 ciety journalism is quite unknown among them. 



These few remarks complete in outline the theory of tittlebats 

 which I venture tentatively to suggest in substitution for Mr. Pick- 

 wick's lost and lamented essay. As its moral may not be immediately 

 apparent to the young, the gay, the giddy, and the thoughtless, I shall 

 not hesitate to append one in the undisguised form borrowed by mod- 

 ern ethical writers from iEsop's fables. If any of my didactic reflec- 

 tions scattered through the text shall have induced only one serious 

 stickleback to abandon polygamy or to renounce cannibalism, I shall 

 feel that this article has not been written in vain. ComJdll Magazine. 



Professor T. B. Stowell advocates the study of natural history in secondary 

 schools because of the adaptability of the subject to insure accuracy in percep- 

 tion, the use of a technical and exact vocabulary, ability to weigh evidence, and 

 the power to classify and generalize. The field is so large and grows so fast that 

 the experienced teacher finds his most difficult task in deciding what not to 

 teach. As in all other branches teachers are supposed to have had some special 

 preparation, so the same qualifications should be required in the teacher of nat- 

 ural history as in the teacher of language, and a corresponding proportion of 

 time should be given to science studies. " With such instruction," says the 

 author, " he will let results establish the claims of natural history in the cur- 

 riculum of secoudarv schools." 



