ORIGIN OF THE SILVER EEL. 23 



itself, it pushed the headed extremity into 

 the spring, and I lost sight of it. I went 

 back the seventh day, and found the light 

 coloured one swimming about ; it disap- 

 peared the eighth day, and I concluded 

 that it followed the other one into the 

 spring. I went every day for a month to 

 see if any of them had issued from the 

 spring, but during that period none made 

 their appearance. I went occasionally during 

 the winter months, but none of them were 

 visible. Had they been so, I must have 

 seen them, as the water was as clear as 

 glass and had not at any time been covered 

 with ice. At first I resolved not to disturb 

 them till May, 1835, when they would be 

 a year old, but I became impatient, not 

 seeing them all the winter, nor observing 

 the retiring of the yellow one, so one fine 

 day in March I took a jug, and lowered the 

 water in the well below the mouth of 

 the spring, and down came both the eels, 

 one yellow, the other dark brown precisely 

 the colours they had when they disap- 

 peared. This convinced me they were the 

 same deposited by the beetle the first week 



