BENEATH TROPIC SEAS 



tortion of their homes. I cut off a generous cube, 

 placed it under water, and listened to it about 

 midnight when the water was so still that there 

 was not even a ripple at the bow of the schooner. 

 Even with my ear against the surface of the sponge, 

 then of the water in the aquarium, and finally 

 against the glass itself, I could hear nothing. I 

 took the piece of sponge out, and within five min- 

 utes, while the water drained slowly from it, I 

 heard seventeen distinct clicks. Two were of dif- 

 ferent timbre, even to my coarse hearing, but I 

 could make no distinction between the others. 

 WTien isolated in a small glass of water, these 

 shrimps produce a snap which is so penetrating 

 that it can be heard fifty feet away. If a piece of 

 sponge is dropped into a dish of formaline the dis- 

 mayed chorus sounds like several bunches of tiny 

 Chinese firecrackers going off at once. I was 

 never fortunate enough to detect any variation in 

 a single individual of this monotonous method of 

 communication . 



There was no question of the decided character 

 of the emotions of the small folk, when the water 

 began draining away in earnest from their cham- 

 bers, dicky click-click, came sharply from some 

 suite in this astonishing apartment house. Click, 

 click, click, echoed the answer, "Our plumbing's- 

 gone-wrong-too " from a neighbor. 



I kept tally of fifty shrimps, and found that in 

 eighteen cases there was a male and female in the 

 same chamber, nine males seemed to be living 



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