BRIEF NOTES ON FISHES. 357 



moment's notice. With the incoming tide that makes up 

 Crosswicks Creek, a score or more of these darters will 

 often stray into each of the little depressions in the 

 adjoining meadows which are slowly covered by the 

 steadily increasing volume of water. These depressions 

 are the faint channels through which the last ripples of 

 the receding waters retire, and are often irregular from 

 the little sand-ridges which the currents and cross-trick- 

 lings form, and also are often dotted with regular, cup- 

 shaped holes where the cows have chanced to pass over 

 the wet sand. At high tide all is serene, and the hungry 

 darters gayly pass to "fresh fields and pastures new," 

 confident of a goodly feast on the myriad insects that the 

 encroaching waters have entrapped. But soon a change 

 comes over the spirit of their realities for, if fishes do 

 not sleep, they can not dream and all unheeding of the 

 fickleness of the tide, they soon find themselves left, not 

 high and dry indeed, but in the little treacherous holes 

 and hollows in the sand and short grass from which the 

 waters crept so stealthily that their suspicion was never 

 aroused. Slowly, too, this lingering water is sinking away 

 in the loose sand, and the burning sun above makes them 

 all the more uncomfortable. " What shall I do ? " each 

 and every one asks, not in so many words, but by so 

 many acts. Around the little shadow of a pond they 

 jerkily crawl, but find no watery outlet. Then, as they 

 quietly contemplate their fix, they find themselves, not 

 short of breath, but of water, and, willing to trust to luck, 

 they give a mighty jump, knowing that they can get 

 in no worse position on the other side of the pitiless 

 ridge of sand that surrounds them. Do they see the re- 

 ceding waters in the distance, as they leap over the sandy 

 ridges and from hollow to hollow, or do they smell the 

 water or hear it flow ? At all events, they jump gener- 



