that the thick and ruthless southern tree is at this very moment
gradually superseding over vast tracts of country its more graceful and
beautiful, but far less voracious competitor.

FISH AS FATHERS.

Comparatively little is known as yet, even in this age of publicity,
about the domestic arrangements and private life of fishes. Not that
the creatures themselves shun the wiles of the interviewer, or are at
all shy and retiring, as a matter of delicacy, about their family
affairs; on the contrary, they display a striking lack of reticence in
their native element, and are so far from pushing parental affection to
a quixotic extreme that many of them, like the common rabbit
immortalised by Mr. Squeers, 'frequently devour their own offspring.'
But nature herself opposes certain obvious obstacles to the pursuit of
knowledge in the great deep, which render it difficult for the ardent
naturalist, however much he may be so disposed, to carry on his
observations with the same facility as in the case of birds and
quadrupeds. You can't drop in upon most fish, casually, in their own
homes; and when you confine them in aquariums, where your opportunities
of watching them through a sheet of plate-glass are considerably
greater, most of the captives get huffy under the narrow restrictions
of their prison life, and obstinately refuse to rear a brood of
hereditary helots for the mere gratification of your scientific
curiosity.

Still, by hook and by crook (especially the former), by observation
here and experiment there, naturalists in the end have managed to piece
together a considerable mass of curious and interesting information of
an out-of-the-way sort about the domestic habits and manners of sundry
piscine races. And, indeed, the morals of fish are far more varied and
divergent than the uniform nature of the world they inhabit might lead
an _a priori_ philosopher to imagine. To the eye of the mere casual
observer every fish would seem at first sight to be a mere fish, and to
differ but little in sentiments and ethical culture from all the rest
of his remote cousins. But when one comes to look closer at their
character and antecedents, it becomes evident at once that there is a
deal of unsuspected originality and caprice about sharks and flat-fish.
Instead of conforming throughout to a single plan, as the young, the
gay, the giddy, and the thoughtless are too prone to conclude, fish are
in reality