IN FEATHERS AXD FUR. 247 
When he is gathered, he is often very dirty, and has to be 
washed and cleaned up for market. The fisherman who gathers 
them, can sometimes catch twelve dozen in a few hours — four or five 
— but you may be sure he don't do anything more that day. 
I told you how the Leeches travel from Asia Minor, but for 
shorter journeys, in France, they are put in bags, seven or eight 
pounds in a bag, packed into a wagon with plenty of straw, and sent 
off. Arrived in Paris, they are emptied into large reservoirs, and 
kept ready for use. 
How many do you suppose there are in a pound? About 
seven hundred 
Perhaps you'd be glad to hear that America is considered the 
best market for Leeches, because we don't grow our own, and I'm 
sure I'm glad of it, for they are not very nice things to live in ponds 
where any other live thing wants to go. 
There is a land Leech, native of Ceylon, which is fully as dis- 
agreeable as the water species, and more of a nuisance, for he don't 
wait for victims to come to him ; he goes after them. 
They are very thick, and often every twig and grass blade will 
have one on it waiting, stretching out his long body to get hold of 
something. They seize on a passer by, crawl up his clothes, get 
at his neck, go. up his coat sleeve, and into his boots. Slim and 
long as they are when they take hold, they soon swell out full and 
large, and, some writers say, "hang from horses and cattle in 
great clusters." 
