THE SCHOOLS OF LITTLE ARROWS 



hoping that impending appetites would be satisfied 

 by the dozens of my outermost brethren. Yet I have 

 never seen any such movement on the part of the 

 members of the " skin " layer of the schooling or- 

 ganism. 



A fairly good index to the dangers which threaten 

 a creature is the number of its eggs. A mouse, a 

 quail and a codfish must produce unusually large 

 numbers of eggs or offspring to balance the great 

 mortality which rages among eggs and young. Yet 

 Little Arrows instead of depositing half a dozen 

 million like the codfish, or even a paltry five hun- 

 dred thousand as the mackerel does, produces only 

 two or three hundred eggs, several times a year. 

 There must be some amply protective circum- 

 stances of which we are wholly ignorant, which 

 stand between Atherina and the need for greater 

 prolificness. 



The eggs are covered with a scanty growth of 

 fine, long hairs, and these become entangled in the 

 first bit of weed or coral they touch. For ten or 

 twelve days they are safely anchored, and the young 

 fish then emerges and becomes a wanderer on the 

 face of the waters. After a few months those that 

 are still alive begin to feel the call of the society of 

 their brethren and of the shore, and little by little 

 work in from the open sea, and form the kinder- 

 garten school of Little Arrows. 



In every country where I have studied Atherinas, 

 their food has been catholic in extent. They seem 

 to refuse nothing that is of animal matter and swal- 



24^5 



