1 66 ANIMALS OF LAND AND SEA 



suming the minute organisms they are concentrating for them- 

 selves. And in addition there are bizarre, 'misshapen forms 

 of very numerous sorts which Hve within the bodies of prac- 

 tically all the larger crustaceans, feasting on their juices with 

 sometimes others living in the same way within them; while 

 many, equally uncanny and deformed, live like lice suck- 

 ing the blood of fishes, and others bore deep into the skin of 

 whales. 



Within the digestive tube of the fishes, whales and sea- 

 birds live certain creatures not found elsewhere, except that 

 some have been found to exist as larvae within the bodies of 

 crustaceans. These are the tapeworms, echinorhynchs, etc., 

 which have no stomachs but absorb through their skin the 

 nutritive fluids in the alimentary canals of their hosts. 



In the middle of the day in the tropics and in the height 

 of the summer in the temperate regions most animals seek the 

 shade and become more or less inactive; animal life is most 

 in evidence early in the morning and again toward evening. 

 At sea most animals, especially in low latitudes and where the 

 sea is clear, seek the shade in just the same way, retreating 

 far below the surface to the twilight zone in the daytime, 

 reappearing at or soon after dark. 



Midway between Bermuda and St. Kitts I have watched 

 the sea for hour after hour without detecting a single living 

 thing. But on one trip we stopped to pick up a buoy that 

 had broken away from its moorings off New Orleans some years 

 previously. Scarcely had the speed begun to slacken before all 

 sorts of creatures began to appear in the shadow of the ship. 

 A small light speck deep down slowly increased in size and 

 was finally revealed as a fifteen foot shark, which insisted, in 

 spite of all discouragement on the part of the sailors, in ac- 

 companying the small boat sent out to attach a fine to the 

 buoy. Other smaller sharks appeared, together with the inevi- 

 table pilot fish, and a troop of those magnificently colored fish 

 called by sailors dolphins, though in no way Hke true dolphins, 

 which are small fish-eating whales. When the buoy was 



