NONSUCH 



dred and fifteen pounds. Readers avid for statistics 

 will welcome the news that each infant shark was 

 one-thirtieth of its parent's length, and as far as 

 weight is concerned it would require more than 

 twenty-two thousand, six hundred of the embryos 

 to balance the scales. 



Although they were less than four inches over 

 all, they would have been born before many weeks. 

 Each was a perfect little shark — fins, snout, 

 mouth, all in place and nearly in proportion, while 

 the presence or absence of claspers indicated clearly 

 the sex. In the first ovary examined there were thir- 

 teen males and twelve females, showing how, even 

 in the lower forms of life, our sex is barely holding 

 its dominance! 



The eye was the organ out of all proportion, and 

 as in the chick it showed that after birth sight would 

 be more important in escaping danger and securing 

 food than all other senses combined. To have one 

 last statistical fling ; if sixteen of the embryo shark's 

 eyes were " laid end to end " they would reach from 

 its head to its tail, while in the parent eighty eyes 

 would be required for the same silly purpose. (But 

 this is all the fault of human language. I look at the 

 embryo and in a glance I sense the difference in 

 eyes, and my mind in an equally short space of time 

 supplies the probable reason, and I get my thrill 

 and it is over. But when I begin to rehash it all, and 

 tie it into awkward verbal knots, all spontaneity 

 seems gone. With all the advantages bequeathed 

 by inventors from Tegumai to Edison, there still 



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