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striped form (0. striatus) constructs a nest with its tail among 
the vegetation at the sides of the tanks, biting off the ends of 
the weeds which are growing in the water. Here the ova are 
deposited, and the male keeps guard. When the little ones 
come forth it is exceedingly interesting to watch them swim- 
ming, generally in two lines, above their parent, which at this 
time is very fierce, and wages war with all intruders. Other 
forms belonging to the same genus similarly protect their 
offspring until old enough to shift for themselves. 
Another amphibious fish, the gouramy (Osphromenus olfaz,) 
at the Mauritius, acts in a very similar manner, frequenting 
the sides of the tanks where vegetation is most abundant; it 
becomes very active during the breeding season, passing in and 
out of its grassy cover, and in some places thickening it by 
entangling all trailing shoots, and thus forming a suitable spot 
for the eggs. Here both parents keep watch until the young 
appear, and over which they keep guard many days. The 
hardback (Callichthys,) of South America, have likewise been 
observed to construct nests of leaves or grass, where the ova 
are placed until hatched, and this spot they carefully watch 
over. A. Agassiz tells us that while examining the marine 
products of the Sargasso Sea, Mr Mansriexp picked up a round 
mass of sargassum about the size of two fists, and having the 
appearance of gulf weed, the branches and leaves of which 
were closely knit to each other; an elastic thread held the 
whole together, and which, on being cut, allowed of the mass 
being opened, the inside of which was found to be full of the 
eggs of the Chironectes fish. 
Passing on to single families of fish, or even restricting our 
investigations to genera, it is interesting to see how even 
closely related forms differ in the places where they deposit 
their ova, or the period when they breed. Among the herrings 
we find that the common herring is breeding in some one or 
other spot around our coast almost every month in the year, 
that it deposits from ten to thirty thousand eggs, which are 
agglutinated together in a mass, and subsiding to the bottom, 
attach themselves to sea-weeds or other suitable substances: let 
this nidus for the eggs be trawled away or otherwise destroyed, 
Oe 
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