Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 31.djvu/854

834 of the bottom, where they may disport themselves at their ease until they grow strong enough to venture on a wider range of thought and action. If rival papas or hungry mammas attempt to devour them, he falls upon the assailants in a violent fury, and carried away, it would appear, by the warmth of his feelings, occasionally goes so far as actually to indulge in acts of cannibalism. For this I do not commend him. No amount of ethical enthusiasm can ever justify a truly moral being in devouring the persons of his fallen enemies.

Fellows of the Royal Geographical Society are probably aware that in the neighborhood of London, and more precisely through the parish of Wandsworth, there flows a minor tributary of Thames, by name the Wandle. This stream, as the sportive youth of South London know full well, abounds in sticklebacks of all ages and sexes; and here it was that Mr. Smee, one of the chief contributors to the modern theory of tittlebats, first observed their habits and manners. "They are very pugnacious and cunning creatures," says he, in his charming work, "My Garden." "They build a nest and protect it. In the middle of May I observed a stickleback evidently guarding a circle of about two inches in diameter, and chasing away every other fish which came within his domain. On closer examination, I saw at the bottom a small circular plate of the same size, made of fiber, but arranged level with the bed of the stream. Suspecting a nest, I carefully raised it, when it proved to contain two parcels of eggs, which were about the size of a large pin's head. I immediately replaced the material as well as I could in its former place; but the stickleback was not at all satisfied with my arrangement, and set to work diligently to adjust it himself. He brought little bits of fiber and thrust them into the mass, and rearranged the larger fibers. When he was perfectly satisfied with what he had done, he mounted guard and rushed at any other fish which came near him. Afterward, I found these nests by scores, each protected by its guardian stickleback; and in the month of May I can always delight my visitors by showing them a nest presided over by the pugnacious little fish." I may add that similar nests are to be found in almost every brook or pond in England at the appropriate season: only, you must be born with the proper eye for seeing them. It is not every man who can discern stickleback. I once conducted a statistical survey of all the lizards inhabiting Great Britain and Ireland, and came to the conclusion, as the result of my census, that the lacertine population of the United Kingdom numbers at least two hundred million, or more than five times the human beings; and yet how often most people on their walks abroad meet a man, and how very, very seldom they happen upon a lizard!

Sticklebacks are not by any means the only fish which thus take care of their helpless progeny during the first weeks of infancy. It must be remembered that our acquaintance with the domestic habits