. Biology in America. Biology. 358 Biology in America than one way to kill a cat," and, vice versa, to save its life and preserve its kind. The depths of the sea are the scene of many a drama. If Science but had the key to Davy Jones' Locker, what a wealth of secrets, tragic as well as comic, she might reveal! There is the fate of the flatfish who fell over on his side before he grew up, and remained lop-sided ever after. And there is the champion cannibal of the animal world, Chias- modus niger, who swallowed his elder brother, acquiring thereby a portly figure of which the most accompli
. Biology in America. Biology. 358 Biology in America than one way to kill a cat," and, vice versa, to save its life and preserve its kind. The depths of the sea are the scene of many a drama. If Science but had the key to Davy Jones' Locker, what a wealth of secrets, tragic as well as comic, she might reveal! There is the fate of the flatfish who fell over on his side before he grew up, and remained lop-sided ever after. And there is the champion cannibal of the animal world, Chias- modus niger, who swallowed his elder brother, acquiring thereby a portly figure of which the most accomplished gour- mand might well be proud. Many a terrific battle has been fought upon the sea— titanic struggles of giant squids and mighty whales, battling to the death. Some of these squids have a spread of tentacles of over eighty feet, and the whales, which are probably the invariable victors in these encounters, bear with them well-. Velella Ori^jinal from a specimen in the zoological collection of the Univer- sity of North Dakota. earned decorations as evidence of their prowess, in the form of circular scars left upon the skin by the suckers of the squid. Floating at the surface of the sea is a host of beings large and small, "creatures of circumstance" driven hither and yon by "every wind that ; Delicately tinted jelly- fish, Velellas with their tiny sails, the "Portuguese Man of War" with its balloon-like float and its vicious stinging tentacles trailing below, the rotund sunfish, and a legion of crustaceans, molluscs and many others, live at or near the surface. What enables them to float so easily? Some are lighter than the water, as the jellyfish and the sunfish, with its jacket of fat beneath the skin. Still others have floating sacks or bladders containing gas, like the "Portuguese Man of War," while others still, the great majority, have pro- jections of some sort, which increase their "specific surface," i. e.,
Size: 1898px × 1316px
Photo credit: © Library Book Collection / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookcontributor, bookpublisherbostonrgbadger, booksubjectbiology
