30 FISH CULTURAL ASSOCIATION. 
several days in wood well moistened with salt water. An inter- 
esting experiment is to obtain a section of wood containing the 
teredos, separate it so that the gallery of one or more is exposed, 
place it in an aquarium, and its remarkable action can be plainly 
observed. 
In addition to the shelly head, the teredo is provided with an 
ingenious appendage at the other end. Should sediment, a bar- 
nacle, an oyster, or other disagreeable neighbor, attempt to close 
up its minute orifice, two small, shelly attachments, resembling 
a half-round wood-file, are protruded from the opening, and 
the intruder kept away, while the entrance is slightly cut and 
cleansed by these files. 
In Aspinwall harbor, the East Indies, and a few other places, 
the teredo grows to the length of four feet, and over an inch 
in diameter. I have in my possession a section of a mahog- 
any log from the former port, filled with perforations seven- 
eighths of an inch in diameter. In the Museum of Natural 
History, Boston, I have seen the hard, calcareous case-lining of 
the teredo, from the East Indies, over one and one-eighth inches 
in diameter. Its occupant must have been four feet in length. 
The wonderful boring apparatus of a mature teredo con- 
tains 20,500 cutting surfaces, forming its ingenious file. Its 
sound is frequently detected by seamen while lying in their 
bunks. A sea-captain informed me that during a recent voyage 
he was caused much anxiety by the presence of the teredo in his 
ship’s timbers. He could plainly hear them boring through the 
wood as he ‘lay in his berth at night. Undoubtedly many a 
fine vessel, never heard from, met her fate through the per- 
sistency of these “ wreckers.”’ 
I have brought here many interesting specimens illustrating 
the ravages of this animal. In these glass tubes are several 
teredos from 12 to 22 inches in length, and from one to two years 
of age. They were obtained by my friend, J. W. Putnam, Esq,., 
Superintendent of the Wood Creosoting Works of the New Or- 
leans and Mobile Railroad Company, at Pascagoula, Miss. 
Here are specimens of yellow pine, spruce, white pine, and ma- 
hogany, obtained respectively from the Gulf of Mexico, San 
Francisco, Wilmington, N. C.; Norfork, Va.; New York, at the 
