THE SUKFACE-NET. 
7 
about ten feet long, diminishing to a point. The 
size of the meshes also diminished until the extreme 
point was formed of gauze, and was not closed, but 
simply tied with a tape. Three or four hoops, sewed 
in transversely at intervals, kept the sides of the net 
from collapsing when in use. When employed, it 
was lowered over the quarter, gradually, so that the 
extremity might be carried out by the ship’s way 
before the brass wire touched the water, to prevent 
entanglement. The wire being on three sides only 
of the mouth, would of course lie perpendicular, and 
the rope-bridle kept it transverse : corks at each 
upper angle of the mouth preserved it from sinking. 
The line was then payed out for ten or twenty fa- 
thoms, so as to pass the net beyond the dead water 
and eddy of the ship’s wake. After awhile it was 
hauled in and examined. A bowl of water being 
ready, the gauze end was untied and turned inside 
out into the bowl, when the contents became disen- 
gaged by floating off, and after the net had been re- 
tied and lowered, were subjected to examination. 
The booty taken by this apparatus, though for the 
most part minute, was not devoid of interest. A 
few of those delicate Pteropoda, the Hyalece, whose 
shells look as if they had been blown out of the 
thinnest glass, occurred ; as also many specimens, 
more or less imperfect, of the CepJialopodous genus 
Spirula, with pearly septa ; to some of these were 
attached several very minute but perfectly developed 
barnacles [Lepas), and many oblong and dark brown 
eggs, apparently of the same cirriped. It was in- 
teresting to see Barnacles no larger than rape-seed 
