Slippery as an Eel. 171 
living condition, and others that it is hatched from the egg. 
The matter has, however, been set at rest by the microscope, 
which shows that the oily-looking substance, generally called 
fat, which is found in the abdomen of the Eel, is really an 
aggregation of eggs, and that these objects, minute as they 
are, and which are not so large as the point of a pin, are 
quite as perfect in their structure as the eggs of a moth ora 
bird are seen to be to the naked, unaided vision. 
Anguilla rostrata, as the Common American Eel is techni- 
cally known, is abundant in the United States, living in fresh- 
water streams, but depositing its eggs, often eight millions to 
a single fish, in the ocean, the young ascending the rivers. 
Eels are devoid of ventral fins. Their scales, which are very 
minute, are covered with a thick, slime-like material. Under 
the microscope each scale is beautifully ornamented, and the 
exquisite pattern formed by the scales on the skin may be 
readily and effectively seen if a bit of it, when fresh, be 
placed on the window-glass and allowed to dry. The sexes 
are difficult to distinguish; the females have the highest 
dorsal fin, smaller eyes, and a lighter color than the males, 
while the snout is generally broader at the tip. 
When contiguous to the sea, as in a pond near Wells, on 
the coast of Maine, the Eels invariably go down into salt 
water at night. As the connecting stream is narrow, the 
sight is remarkable, thousands filling the channel, many of 
whom, when alarmed, leaving the water and passing over the 
dry rocks to the ocean. Eels are not the silent creatures 
which many persons suppose them to be. They frequently 
utter a sound, expressed by a single note, which is more 
distinctly musical than the sounds made by other fishes, and 
which has a clear metallic resonance. They are of slow 
growth, scarcely reaching the length of twelve inches during 
the first year, but subsequently attaining to large dimensions, 
the preserved skins of two Eels, which Mr. Yarrall saw at 
Cambridge, England, weighing together fifty pounds, the 
heavier being twenty-seven pounds in weight. 
