THE DRAWING OF THE SEINE. 163 



They were strong, active, and apparently wholly unaf- 

 fected by breathing the atmosphere, or by the slimy 

 mass to which I have referred. None were six inches 

 in length, and several scarcely measured four, yet these 

 eels, evidently very young, were hatched in salt water, 

 fully one hundred miles distant from the quiet nook in 

 Poaetquissings from which they had been so rudely 

 dragged. To reach tliis spot, what a journey they must 

 have taken ! As I looked at them, it seemed incredible 

 that they should have been bred in the sea, and yet the 

 journey hither need not, after all, have taxed them much. 

 I tested the speed of several, and estimated it at one 

 yard in two seconds. This is more than a mile in an 

 hour, and if these eels kept a straight, up-river course 

 until they reached the mouth of Poaetquissings Creek, 

 four days would have brought them here; and these in- 

 dividuals were probably ten times four days old, and 

 possibly a good deal older. 



But why do they come? What impels these young 

 eels, literally by the million, to go up stream as soon 

 as born ? Up, up, up, until the mere moist earth of some 

 far-distant spring is reached. Even here, they do not 

 always stop, but, leaving every trace of water, travel 

 overland through the damp grass, and find a check to 

 their progress only in stretches of dry sand ; nor, by the 

 way, is this so uncommon an occurrence as is usually 

 thought. Eels are fish, and, of course, must be con- 

 sidered as aquatic, yet they are occasionally terrestrial 

 creatures ; but of this hereafter. 



The life-history of the eel is very imperfectly under- 

 stood. It is certain that such young eels as wander so 



