TORPIDITY OF KEPTILES. 137 



which can be truly said, as far we know, to 

 enter into a state of periodical torpidity. Fishes 

 inhabiting ponds and lakes may be occasionally 

 frozen up in ice, when they become stiff, and 

 apparently dead, but upon being cautiously 

 thawed they revive. May we not call these 

 instances, examples of a torpid state induced 

 by accident ? However this may be, eels cer- 

 tainly afford an example of periodical hyberna- 

 tion, at least in our colder latitudes. " During 

 the cold months of the year, eels remain 

 imbedded in mud ; and large quantities are 

 frequently taken by eel-spears in the soft beds 

 of harbours, and banks of rivers from which 

 the tide recedes, and leaves the surface exposed 

 for several hours every day. The eels bury 

 themselves twelve or sixteen inches deep, near 

 the edge of the navigable channel, and gene- 

 rally near some of the many land-drains, the 

 water of which continues to run in its course 

 over the mud into the channel during the 

 whole time the tide is out. In Somersetshire, 

 the people know how to find the holes in the 

 banks of rivers in which eels are laid up by 

 the hoar-frost not lying over them, as it does 

 elsewhere, and dig them out in heaps. The 

 practice of searching for eels in mud in cold 

 weather is not confined to this country. Dr. 

 Mitchell, in his paper on the fishes of New York, 

 published in the Transactions of the Literary 

 and Philosophical Society of that city, says, ' In 

 winter, eels lie concealed in the mud, and are 

 taken in great numbers by spears.' Thus 

 b8 



