10 THE NATURAL HISTORY OF THE COMMON CRAYFISH. 



not spared. Craj^fishes, in fact, are guilty of canni- 

 balism in its worst form ; and a French observer pa- 

 thetically remarks, that, under certain circumstances, 

 the males '^ meconnaissent les plus saints devoirs;^' and, 

 not content with mutilating or killing their spouses, 

 after the fashion of animals of higher moral pretensions, 

 they descend to the lowest depths of utilitarian turpitude, 

 and finish by eating them. 



In the depth of winter, however, the most alert of 

 crayfish can find little enough food ; and hence, when 

 they emerge from their hiding-places in the first warm 

 days of spring, usually about March, the crayfishes are in 

 poor condition. 



At this time, the females are found to be laden with 

 eggs, of which from one to two hundred are attached be- 

 neath the tail, and look like a mass of minute berries 

 (fig. 3, B). In May or June, these eggs are hatched, and 

 give rise to minute young, which are sometimes to be 

 found attached beneath the tail of the mother, under 

 whose j)rotection they spend the first few days of their 

 existence. 



In this country, we do not set much store upon cray- 

 fishes as an article of food, but on the Continent, and 

 especially in France, they are in great request. Paris 

 alone, with its two millions of inhabitants, consumes 

 annually from five to six millions of crayfishes, and pays 

 about ^16,000 for them. The natural productivity of the 

 rivers of France has long been inadequate to supply the 



