Fisli and Fishijig in America. 



391 



iilently sold by market-dealers as such. 

 It deposits its eggs on the bottom at 

 various depths and conditions of the 

 water ; on the coasts of Great Britain at 

 a depth of seventy to one hundred and 

 forty feet in water of full oceanic salt- 

 ness, and in some of the estuaries of the 

 Baltic in water that is comparatively 

 fresh and only two or three feet in 

 depth. This latter practice sugg-ests 

 that of the shad (closely allied to the 

 herring), which ascends to the upper 

 spring waters to spawn ; the herring, 

 however, on the Atlantic coast, has 



never been known to enter water in the 

 least degree brackish. When in the act 

 of spawning, the parent fish dart rapidly 

 about, and the -water becomes cloudy 

 with the flow of the milk of the male, 

 the impregnated eggs, not larger than 

 No. 7 shot, falling rapidly to the bot- 

 tom, and immediately become attached 

 to stones, shingle, old shells, sand or 

 seaweed, and not infrequently to the 

 backs of living crabs and other Crus- 

 tacea, adhering tenaciously to whatever 

 they fall upon, and maturing in from 

 twenty-five to thirty-five days. 



(To be continued.) 



THE LARVA STACK OK THE HEL(;KAMITE (;R DOBSON. 



