EELS. i8i 



larger one is seen amongst them, of a dark colour, and almost black. They are thrown 

 into a tub of salt, which cleanses them; they are then boiled, and pressed into cakes, which 

 are cut into slices and fried, making the most delicious food. Sometimes they are so 

 abundant that the people about get tired of eating them, and actually feed the pigs with 

 them. Here there is a branch of fish-culture, which, I am sure, Mr. Francis will agree with 

 me ought decidedly not to be neglected; and that these little Eels, which in a short time 

 would increase their weight, and therefore their value a thousand-fold, should be looked after 

 and not suffered to be lost to the resources of the country." 



Eel-fare, once a striking and remarkable sight in the Thames, no longer exists on 

 account of the filthy water about London, in which it has been proved that Eels cannot live 

 any length of time. Mr. Francis has little doubt that when the Thames is once more purified 

 "Eel-fare" will in time again recur to it. 



I have occasionally taken small transparent specimens — the majority are dark olive 

 sometimes almost black — in which the action of the heart and gills is plainly visible. Mr. 

 Couch thinks this transparent Eel may be a different species, and states he has never ob- 

 served it in companies. According to my own experience, however, these light-coloured 

 Eels are gregarious, and occur in company with the darker specimens. I have never 

 succeeded in keeping young Eels of two or three inches long beyond the space of a few 

 weeks in confinement ; they are delicate little fellows, and, though they twist about with 

 lively emotion, are doubtless not "as merry as grigs." It is impossible to obtain a better 

 subject than a young transparent Eel for the examination of the lymphatic pulse at the end 

 of the tail, first described by the late Dr. Marshall Hall. 



Eels are pre-eminently nocturnal animals and fond of the dark. Towards evening the 

 juvenile sniggler knows that he has the best chance of success. They always congregate at 

 the darkest places of the stews in which they are kept, and invariably select the darkest 

 nights for their autumnal migration to the sea. They will not start on their journey on 

 moonlight nights ; the darker and the more stormy the night, the better for a voyage. Millers 

 are well aware of this fact, and take care to set their traps accordingly, when they are sure 

 of a large catch. Eels are unable to endure very severe cold, unless there is plenty of mud 

 or sand in which they can hide themselves ; if kept in artificial stews without this necessary 

 essential, they will, in frosty weather, grow quickly thin, and die in a few days. Eels generally 

 lie buried in the mud during the winter, but, if the weather prove mild and there is abun- 

 dance of rain, they will leave their holes and proceed with the floods on their migrations.* 

 The mild winter of i85i, I was informed by a miller in my own neighbourhood, who takes 

 many hundred-weight in the course of the twelve months, was favourable to the capture of 

 Eels. In December of that year half a ton was taken after a flood, and continuously to 

 March, 1862, captures were made each month. Eels will not start on their migrations unless 

 after a flood, or at any rate without a flush of water. From November, 1862, to June, 1863, 

 not an Eel was taken in the traps, the weather having been remarkably dry. The instinct 

 of the Eels doubtless causes them to wait for a flush of water to carry them down quickly 

 to the salt water. In that curious old work by Juliana Berners, the following notice of the 

 Eel occurs : — " The Ele is a quaysy (quasi ?) Fysshe. A ravenour and devourer of the brode 

 of Fysshe, and the Pike also is a devourer of Fysshe. I put them bothe behinde al other 

 for to angle. For this Ele ye shall finde an hole in the grounde of water, and it is blew and 

 blackyshe. There put in your hooke till that it be a foote within the hole, and your bayte 

 shall be a great anglet witch or a menowe."t 



* As a contribution to Shropshire folk-lore I may mention the following couplet which I have heard in my 

 neighbourhood : — 



"When the w-allow (willow) has leaves as big as mouse's ears, 

 Then sniggles, they'll run, they dunna care wheeres." 



f Trcalyse on Fyssynge. 



