8 A BOOK OF THE RUNNING BROOK : 



Of the somewhat less ancient superstition of 

 one's childhood that horse-hairs cut up and 

 deposited in water would turn into eels it is 

 hardly necessary to speak, for who cannot re- 

 member those unpleasant little bottles, erst 

 used for medicine, which garnished the nursery, 

 and in which the propagation of eels from 

 horse-hair was carried on with the profound 

 faith of childhood ? 



Eels generally shed their spawn in April; 

 and, when not hindered, they almost invariably 

 choose an estuary, where they scatter the spawn 

 loosely in the sand or soil. But that an annual 

 visit to the sea is by no means necessary to 

 their existence is proved by the fact that many 

 eels who inhabit inland ponds and lakes never 

 go to the sea at all. A gentleman digging in 

 the month of October in the gravel banks of the 

 river Stour found the place " alive with young 

 eels, some of them scarcely hatched, at the 

 depth of from five to fifteen inches ;" and at one 

 of the meetings of the British Association for the 

 Advancement of Science a member stated that he 

 had seen a considerable number of young eels rise 



