72 SCIENCE FROM AN EASY CHAIR 



cut a long story short, these Leptocephali were found 

 twelve years ago in large numbers in the deep water 

 (400 fathoms) of the Straits of Messina by the Italian 



FIG. 6. Young stages of the common eel, drawn of the natural size by 

 Professor Grassi. A, The Leptocephalus, transparent stage. D, the 

 elver, or young eel, which is coloured, and of much smaller size than the 

 transparent, colourless creature by the change of which it is produced. 

 It is the elver which swims in millions up our rivers. B and C are 

 intermediate stages, showing the gradual change of A into D. 



naturalists Grassi and Calandruccio, and they conclusively 

 showed that they were the young phase the tadpole, as 

 it were of eels. They showed that different kinds of 

 eels conger eels, the Muraena,and the common eel have 



