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undertakes this important business with the same 

 sort of caution that it uses to seek a meal. 



In fact, even greater caution is necessary to this 

 end. To insure the certainty of survival of the 

 greatest number of young, it is necessary that the 

 eggs be dispersed over the widest range possible; 

 and to accomplish this the female must make more 

 extended journeys than is her usual wont. What 

 greater safety, then, can be offered for this than 

 the cover of darkness 4 ? 



During these nuptial nights, the males swarm 

 the waters in myriads. But with the free-swimming 

 polychsete worm it is wedlock without union. Both 

 eggs and sperms are freed into the water to come 

 into contact of their own accord. Now if there be 

 anything mysterious about the whole affair, it is 

 in the fact that this extraordinary swarming of the 

 males occurs invariably during that phase of the 

 moon when it is new, that is to say, during the only 

 period of the month when the night is likely to be 

 darkest. 



From this mission of marriageless love, the 

 males never return. The supreme purpose for 

 which they lived now having been achieved, they 

 resign themselves to death, making no effort to 



[169] 



