44 THE NATURAL HISTORY AND HABITS 



have been about three weeks in this state, one may 

 perceive through the hard skin a divided black spot, 

 which are the eyes of the young fish. The body is 

 too transparent to be seen with the naked eye, but 

 after four weeks, if you squeeze one of the eggs 

 between your fingers, you will see the fish make a 

 motion, and turn within ; then you perceive his form. 

 "At last after lying five weeks in this state, and 

 under a continual current of running water, the 

 young fishes will bare their heads through the shell 

 of the egg ; and under motion with their bodies, will, 

 in about half an hour, free themselves entirely from 

 the shell, with the yolk of the mother-egg hanging 

 to their bellies like a small bag. So soon as they are 

 out of the egg, they will still lie in the cavities be- 

 tween the gravel, and have then the appearance as 

 if the head of a pin was fastened to a reddish field 

 pea, on account of these hanging bags. For three or 

 four weeks they receive their nourishment from the 

 substance contained in this bag, till by degrees, as 

 the fishes grow larger, the bag disappears ; then they 

 begin gradually to assume the shape of fishes, and 

 having no further sustenance from this bag, they will 

 seek for food themselves. But as in so small a com- 

 pass as this breeding trough, there cannot be a suffi- 

 cient quantity of small insects to be found for their 

 sustenance, they seek for more room, where they may 

 meet with them in greater abundance ; they follow 

 then the current of the water, and slip through the 

 brass grate at the end of the box, where you should 

 have a large wooden tub, like a brewer's cooler, or 

 a small clean fish pond covered with gravel, to receive 

 them, in which they will grow in about six months 

 considerably. 



