932 THE SEA-HORSE AND ITS YOUNG: 
eviction of the immature young, which has been already 
described. The debility caused by the consumption of the 
parent, together with the weakening of acclimation, seems 
to have impelled to the act. 
But with the exclusion of the young, the marsupial like- 
ness stops in the Sea-horse, though the young Pipe-tishes 
are said to reénter the pouch on finding themselves in 
danger. It is my belief that with the Sea-horse the ter- 
mination of development is the end of their solicitude for 
the young. 
As to the moral relation of the sexes in this apparently 
abnormal creature, I must regard it, on the instinctive 
side, as but little superior to the relation of a pistillate to 
a staminate plant. The emission of the ova by the one is 
a simpler matter, all the facts considered, than the seeding 
of the other. Certainly the love emotion, if any, must be 
very simple, scarcely more than the poetic figment of the 
loves of the flowers. Is not the fertilization of the spawn 
performed by the male after its reception into the embry- 
onal pouch? . Besides, that which is usually normal in the 
female, is in this instance wholly wanting, namely, affec- 
tion for, and even the knowledge of the young; for she 
never sees them, Whereas the male,even though pressed 
by hunger, will not molest his offspring,—a remark- 
able fact, when we reflect that generally fishes have no 
scruples against devouring any fry, even their own. This 
trait of the male Sea-horse is found in the male Stickle- 
back. The former is not very demonstrative, nor can he 
be, owing to his organization; but the latter is highly £0, 
even to vindictiveness, as I have seen him severely pun- 
ish the female in his anxiety for the safety of the spawn- 
ele are other undetermined, although interesting facts, 
_ connected with this question of sexual relation. What is 
