THE NORTH SEA 89 



good condition in January, and spawns shortly 

 afterward. The actual time is the middle of 

 February. The cod follows immediately, say, 

 about the beginning or middle of March. 



The most far-reaching conclusion is that the eggs 

 of nearly all the more important round fishes, and 

 also the food flat fishes, are freely suspended in the 

 water, not very far from the surface, where they 

 float separately, and at a widening distance from 

 one another. The myriad eggs of a spawning cod, 

 for instance, would rise and scatter, and each egg 

 would take a course of its own. They are there- 

 fore not exposed to any wholesale catastrophe ; and 

 are safe, except from such unavoidable risks as tide, 

 current, and marine enemies, which are by no 

 means inventions of yesterday. 



The actual risks to these floating eggs are quite 

 sufficient without inventing new ones. Long before 

 trawlers were heard of, and while the demand on 

 the fish market was as yet of the modestest 

 dimensions, nature met a well-nigh infinite loss by 

 a well-nigh infinite supply. Before the first line 

 was cast into the sea, a single cod produced its 

 nine or ten million eggs, ripening them not all at 

 once, but over an interval of six weeks, that they 

 might not be exposed at the same time. 



