88 osteoglosshxe. 



of these structures they appeared like miniature lagoons. The walls of the nest were 

 about eight inches thick at the top, and compact, being made of the stems of the 

 grasses removed by the fish from the centre of the nest. 



"The floor of the nest was the swamp-bottom, and was made perfectly smooth and 

 bare. 



" Once I watched a 'Fantang,' as the natives call this fish, making its nest. It 

 was circling round and round the wall of its nest, every now and then throwing its 

 tail upwards and outwards, tossing on to the top of the wall the debris from the inside 

 of the nest. Thus it toiled on until the wall reached the surface of the water and was 

 complete. When the nest was finished, the water it contained was perfectly clean 

 and clear, so that I could see with my water-telescope the eggs nearly covering the 

 bottom of the nest. When all the eggs are laid, the fish leaves the nest by a hole at 

 one side. 



"The eggs, which measure 2 J mm., then appear to hatch in about two days, though, 

 owing to the distance the nests were from my quarters, of this I am not certain. The 

 nest appears to be used for at most four or five days. As soon as the larvae are 

 hatched, they begin to strike up from the bottom. The day after hatching they may 

 be seen continually passing up and down, and are now provided with long external 

 gill-filaments of a blood-red colour, but not so numerous or so long as in the case of 

 Gymnarchus. The following day they cease to pass up and down, and, converging to a 

 swarm about one foot in diameter, form a deep continuous circle remarkable for its 

 regularity and persistence. 



" The swarm occupies the centre of the little lagoon. The young fry, which by now 

 have lost the long external gill-filaments, are seen to be steadily careering round and 

 round ever in the same direction for at least a day. 



" About the fourth day the swarm becomes less persistent and regular, the larvae 

 swimming first to one side of the nest and then to the other, until about the fifth day 

 they leave the nest by the exit for a few trial trips attended by the parent, and finally 

 leave it altogether, swimming hither and thither in a dense swarm, from which the 

 parent is never far distant. I kept a large number of the young for several weeks, but 

 could not get them to feed, and eventually they all died." 



