Popular Science Montlihf 



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sighting danger causes the valve 

 to open spasmodically, thus al- 

 lowing an inrush of water or air. 

 Sometimes the pullers die while 

 still inHated, and they remain 

 in that shape, being often driven 

 ashore by the wind and dried 

 on the beach by the sun. 



The Japanese make lanterns 

 of them when the\' find them in 

 that condition. Tiie\' cut out 

 the back and suspend a candle 

 from a wire into the fish bo<l\ . 



A fragment of yartta showing the 

 sponge-like construction of the interior 

 in which resinous substance is secreted 



as shown in one of the accompanying il- 

 lustrations which are published by 

 courtesy of the New York Zoological 

 Society. The light shows as brightly 

 through the stretched skin as througli 

 a piece of oiled paper. 



Some of the puffers are covered with 

 spines which become rigidly erect when 

 the skin is inflated. This species is also 

 known as the sea porcupine. All the 

 puffers have hard, strong beaks like 

 parrots, which are well adapted for 

 crushing the shells of the crabs and 

 mollusks upon which they liv^e. At cer- 

 tain times of the year, probably during 

 the months that contain no "R," they 

 are considered poisonous in the tropics, 

 so much so that the gall of a Japanese 

 species was formerly used to poison arrows. 



The appearance of the yareta from a 

 distance is that of a huge recumbent sheep 



The Strange Vegetable of Peru That 

 Resembles a Sheep 



ACURIOl'S plant growing in Peru 

 is known to the native as "Yareta" 

 or "vegetable sheep." It grows abun- 

 dantly among rocks at high altitudes 

 along the Andes of Bolivia and Peru, 

 where it constitutes a conspicuous fea- 

 ture in the landscape because of its 

 peculiar manner of developing the so- 

 calletl "polster," or cushion formation. 



The "yareta" forms hillocks or small 

 mounds often three feet high and some- 

 times several feet in diameter. More- 

 over, the entire mound is made up of 

 a single plant, not of a colony of indi- 

 viduals, and it attains this enormous size 

 and extreme compactness by a process 

 of repeated branching, so that the ulti- 

 mate branches are closely crowded and 

 the outer surface is continuous. 



The flowers of the "yareta" are very 

 thin, only about one-eighth of an inch 

 long, and are borne in small dusters near 

 the tips of the branches. The fruit re- 

 sembles a miniature caraway seed. The 

 natives use the plant as fuel. 



