THE EELS AND THEIR ALLIES 2821 



should very young eels be introduced from the mouths of rivers into inland 

 pieces of water, they invariably develop into fish of the female sex, as it was sup- 

 posed males were never to be seen in fresh water. Whether such waters are really 

 conducive to the destruction of young male eels, appears to be a subject requiring 

 further elucidation. The female eels are those usually captured when descending 

 toward the mouths of rivers during the autumn months, while such as are develop- 

 ing toward a breeding condition do not seem to feed at these periods. Males have 

 been usually obtained from the mouths of rivers or in brackish waters; and Dr. 

 Paul, having discovered that among elvers, or young eels, captured in such locali- 

 ties were males, ascertained (at least so he asserts) that when transported to fresh 

 waters, they retained their masculine character, developing into adults. Some 

 have been captured ten or twelve miles up rivers; but, although male eels undoubt- 

 edly ascend rivers, their proportionate number to that of females decreases in ac- 

 cordance to the distance from the sea. Sterile eels are found in fresh waters, and 

 likewise in those which are brackish, where they may often be captured feeding, 

 but these fish, of course, cannot increase in numbers unless they have access to the 

 sea, and consequently above impassable barriers they die out, should no young be 

 introduced. The migrations of these fishes may be said to be annually, adults de- 

 scending seaward to breed, as they do in the Severn, about the month of Septem- 

 ber, although this migration in Norfolk is asserted to begin as early as July. There 

 is likewise an up-stream migration of young eels, or elvers, in the earlier months of 

 the year up to May or June, or even later; during this period the banks of the 

 rivers being in places black with these migrating little fishes. These young eels 

 have been observed to ascend flood gates of lochs, to creep up water pipes or drains; 

 in short, mechanical difficulties scarcely obstruct them, and they will even make a 

 circuit over a wet piece of ground in order to attain a desirable spot. ' ' In order to 

 give some idea of the vast numbers of young eels that take part in these migrations, 

 or, as they are popularly called " eel fares, "it may be mentioned that upward of three 

 tons of elvers were dispatched in a single day from the Gloucester district in the 

 spring of 1886, and that it has been calculated that over fourteen thousand of these 

 fish go to make a pound weight. In the previous year the annual consumption of 

 eels was estimated at a minimum of 1,650 tons, with a total value of $632,450. It 

 is almost superfluous to mention that eels pass the greater portion of their time 

 when in fresh water buried in the mud, from which they issue forth at night to 

 feed. During the cold of winter large masses of them are not unfrequently found 

 tightly coiled together for the sake of mutual warmth. The largest species occur 

 in the islands of the South Pacific and New Zealand, where they inhabit lakes; 

 specimens from these regions having been recorded to measure from eight to ten. 

 feet in length. 



Resembling the true eels in the presence of pectoral fins, in the 

 tail being surrounded by the median fin, and the free tongue, the 

 gigantic marine forms known as congers differ in being scaleless, in the deep cleft 

 of the mouth, in the presence of a set of teeth on the outer sides of the jaw placed 

 so close to one another as to form a cutting edge, and by the dorsal fin commencing 

 at a point just behind the base of the pectorals. The common conger {Conger 



