STUDIES IN INSECT LIFE, ETC. 



hitherto been found only in the Indian or Pacific 

 Oceans. 



One of the triumphs of this expedition was to 

 extend still further the brilliant researches of the 

 Dane, Schmidt, into the obscure life-history of 

 the common eel, supported as they had been by 

 certain finds of the Irish Fishery Board. The 

 " Michael Sars " captured younger stages of the 

 larva (Leptocephalus) than had hitherto been 

 taken ; in fact specimens between one and two 

 centimetres in length. These were found south 

 of the Azores, and Hjort says he presumes " that 

 this peculiar distribution can only be explained 

 by supposing that the eel spawns south of the 

 Azores and that the eggs and larvae pass through 

 their early stages there, being later carried into 

 the North Atlantic and towards the coast of 

 northern Europe by the Gulf Stream/' 



Although as a general rule the deep-sea forms 

 tend to run rather small, there are exceptions to 

 this, especially in the Polar regions. There we 

 find certain Isopod Crustacea, represented on 

 land by the wood-louse and on our shores by 

 small forms barely an inch long, growing to the 

 size of crayfish or lobsters ; while very large 

 pteropods, a group of floating mollusca, which 



