300 WASTE-LAND WANDERINGS. 



at first, only peeped out and upward, and if I made the 

 slightest movement away they went. At last I suc- 

 ceeded in refraining even from a wink, and very slowly 

 they emerged from their stony caverns ; but even now 

 they would not venture beyond a few inches from the 

 pier, and watched for movements on my part rather 

 than food. These mere mites of fishes, scarcely three 

 months old, had wise heads on their shoulders. How 

 the old naturalists could suppose a fish passed a mere 

 mechanical existence is indeed a puzzle. Did they nev- 

 er see living fish ? 



Quantities of eels kept passing in full view, all going 

 up the creek. They were quite uniform in size, meas- 

 uring perhaps a foot in length. I should be glad to 

 know their errand, but it is too late in the day to follow 

 them. Were they larger, and in shallower waters, prob- 

 ably they might be heard. A kindly disposed critic, 

 referring to my essay on the voices of fresh-water fishes, 

 says : " We own that we should much like to listen, on a 

 still summer evening, to a nocturne performed by a 

 school of catfish." So should I; and if by remaining 

 to-night upon the creek I might be so fortunate, I should 

 certainly stay ; but the difficulty rests here. The vocal 

 power of a catfish, if I mistake not, consists of but a 

 faint humming sound, seldom if ever uttered except 

 during the breeding season. It is otherwise with the 

 eels ; they pipe a single, half-metallic note at frequent 

 intervals, and quite as often in August as in early spring. 

 Most unsatisfactory, indeed, it is, as I know to my sorrow, 

 to wait for hours until the eels have congregated and all 

 seems favorable, and then bull-frogs in the marshes, katy- 



