102 CONSRIBUTIONS TO THE NATURAL HISTORY OF ALASKA. 



of skins of small worms which frequent the ponds and low grounds. I was unable to save any 

 specimens of worms, supposed to be larvae of some kind, as the alcohol in which they were placed 

 reduced them to an unrecognizable condition. 



The spawning season is in June and July, or as soon as the lagoons thaw out sufficiently. The 

 eggs are deposited in the vegetable slime at the bottoms of the shallow ponds. 



MICROSTOMIDiE. 



83. Osmerus dentex Steindachuer. (See Fig. X.) 



The smelt arrives sparingly at Saint Michael's about the 1st of June. The first appearance of 

 the fish is generally known from its being caught with others in small shore-seines or else on a 

 hook set for other fish ; though they rarely bite at the hook in those waters. By the middle of 

 June the fish have become abundant. They appear to come from the southwest, and arrive in 

 small schools at the beginning of their approach to the shore, and later come in schools of several 

 yards wide and many rods in length. They swim along the shore, seeking places to spawn. The 

 spawning season begins in the latter part of June and continues until the middle of Jnly. The 

 eggs are deposited among the sea- weeds, which grow just below the surface of the lowest tides. 

 They disappear by the last of July. 



The Eskimo catch great quantities of these fish and dry them in the air. The fish are gener- 

 ally obtained by means of a short seine about twice or three times as long as wide. The fish are 

 then drawn on shore, where they remain in heaps until the women take the entrails out by a dex- 

 trous pinch of the thumb aud forefinger, which tears apart the flesh between the gills and belly. 

 The forefinger is then run inside the fish and the belly ripped open, which same movement takes 

 out the offal. The women in the fall have prepared great quantities of grass blades, which are 

 twisted into a thin rope, which is run through the gills and out the mouth of the fish, or else the 

 strands of the rope are twisted around the fish's head as the rope is made. These strings of fish 

 are then hung on poles in the open air. After having dried for a sufficient time the fish are then 

 stored in the caches. 



When dried these fish are not bad eating, as there is sufficient oil in them to prevent their 

 drying too hard, and 3 T et not enough to become too rancid. 



The Eskimo name of these fish is Ithl kicdg nulc. 



I have not seen this species among the Aleutian Islands, though it doubtless occurs there. 



85. Mallotus villosus (Miiller) Cuv. 



This species ranges over the entirecoastliueof'Beriug Sea. On the American side they are most 

 abundant south of latitude 60°; and, above that are known to me only from a few specimens seen 

 in the dried state with another fish, Hi/pumesus olidus. 



Among the Aleutian islands these fish abound in incredible numbers. 



At Atkha Island in 1879 I had an opportunity to observe these fish as they came in to the sandy 

 beach of Nazan Bay to spawn. The 21st of July of that year a boy brought a basket of these fish 

 and asked me to buy them. I inquired where he had obtained them. He replied that they were 

 abundant along the sandy beach not far from the village. I immediately went to the place and 

 found that the waves of the preceding day had thrown millions of these fish on the beach. The 

 number was increasing every time a wave was broken on the beach. The fish come to the sandy 

 beach to spawn, and when a high wave runs on the sandy flat the fish cast their spawn at that 

 time. The spawn is covered with the sand, which the retreating wave washes back with it. The 

 dead fish were so thick on the beach that it was impossible to walk without stepping on hundreds 

 of them. They could be gathered with a shovel, they laid so thickly. The spawn is very small, 

 the eggs not larger than the size of half a pin-head, and is extended in small masses, which are held 

 together by a viscid mass which is ejected at the same time. If the sand does not cover it in- 

 stantly the mass is soon nothing but a small rounded ball about a quarter of an inch in diameter, 

 of fine sand held together by the egg mass. This is rolled over and over by each wave until it is 

 but little injured by the action of the waves. 



The eggs which are hidden by the sand soon show signs of life, usually about thirty days after 

 deposit. The beach then becomes a quivering mass of eggs and sand. As soon as the eggs are 



