1 64 THE HAUNTS OF LIFE 



only in sunlight, and a passing cloud will cause 

 them all to disappear like a flash, but when the 

 sun shines out again they swim steadily on 

 their way. 



It used to be the custom in some places to 

 catch these little creatures in baskets, to use 

 them for bait, or even to fry them in cakes. 

 But in other places it is realised that this is a 

 short-sighted policy, since the full-grown eels 

 are much more valuable as food. Instead, 

 therefore, of trapping the elvers, people some- 

 times hang ropes of straw over the rocky places 

 to help them on their way up the river. 



From the rivers the elvers push on into the 

 smaller streams and people the ponds and lakes 

 connected with them. If the water or the food- 

 supply in one pond gets low, they have no 

 difficulty in finding another, for, unlike most 

 fishes, they are able to live for a considerable 

 time out of water, and they have a way of 

 wriggling themselves through damp grass for 

 quite considerable distances. One naturalist 

 tells us that he kept two small eels for a time 

 in an aquarium, and " they passed most of the 

 day buried in the sand at the bottom, but night 

 after night they made their escape and were 

 always found in the morning at the other side 



