Nuiriiion and Reproduction. 147 



Thus is the drama of life played among the 

 highest creatures as it is among the lowest, — with 

 this difference : in the higher life the whole process 

 of decline and decay is retarded, — life does not 

 pass suddenly to the catastrophe, as it does in the 

 case of the butterfly. 



But even here Death stands ready to follow 

 Love. The season of love is a sign of coming 

 dissolution. Here too, as in the amoeba, an 

 incipient starvation is felt, though not recognized 

 as such. 



In the salmon the glow of the skin does not pro- 

 ceed from excessive nutrition ; on the contrary, it is 

 the result of increased activity, joined to lessened 

 nutritive material; for during its season of repro- 

 ductive activity, although such profound changes 

 are affecting its body, it does not eat, and the 

 great changes are effected at the expense of the 

 material already accumulated. The skin changes 

 are in truth a form of disintegration, of breaking 

 down; they speak of death rather than of life. 

 This again recalls the butterfly, with its super- 

 active winged life and its delicate nutriment; and 

 the final death of the salmon, unable to recover 

 from the stupendous reproductive loss, again recalls 

 the fate of the butterfly. 



Most of the skin changes which occur at the 

 reproductive period are, from a physiological point 

 of view, waste. 



The overwhelming and sometimes fierce demand 



