characteristics of their kind. On the other hand, 

 there exist many familiar species, such as the com- 

 pound ascidians and the zoophytes, which no 

 amount of care or coddling will continue to keep 

 alive. Yet even some professional workers seem 

 not to be aware that in numerous instances confine- 

 ment, if it does not kill, sometimes so alters the 

 behavior of an animal that it reflects not at all 

 the history or the habits of its native haunts. Thus 

 we have the astounding statement issued under 

 the aegis of the largest institutional repository of 

 scientific knowledge in this country purporting 

 that the hippocampids "converse with one another 

 ... by sounds proceeding from their mouths." 

 And this conversation, it is maintained, is kept up 

 between individuals "isolated in separate glass re- 

 ceptacles some few yards apart." 



Such nonsensical observations so gravely set 

 forth in print are misleading in ways other than 

 the major premise would imply. Aside from the 

 ridiculous assumption that these creatures are pos- 

 sessed of an audible speech, we are led to infer 

 that their hearing is most acute. The truth is, the 

 sea-horse is as deaf as the deadest mummy ever 

 found in a pharaoh's tomb. The sounds — sharp, 



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