MODE OF CATCHING JELLY-FISHES.
Fig. 122. Ptychogena, natural size.
Not the least attractive feature in the study of these animals, is the mode of catching them. We will suppose it to be a warm, still morning at Nahant, in the last week of August, with a breath of autumn in the haze that softens the outlines of the opposite shore, and makes the horizon line a little dim. It is about eleven o'clock, for few of the Jelly-fishes are early risers; they like the warm sun, and at an earlier hour they are not to be found very near the surface. The sea is white and glassy, with a slight swell but no ripple, and seems almost motionless as we put off in a dory from the beach near Saunders's Ledge. We are provided with two buckets, one for the larger Jelly-fishes, the Zygodactyla, Aurelia, &c., the other for the smaller fry, such as the various kinds of Ctenophoræ, the Tima, Melicertum, &c. Beside these, we have two nets and glass bowls, in which to take up the more fragile creatures that cannot bear rough handling. A bump or two on the stones before we are fairly launched, a shove of the oar to keep the boat well out from the rocks along which we skirt for a moment, and now we are off. We pull around the point to our left and turn toward the Ledge, filling our buckets as we go. Now we are crossing the shallows that make the channel between the inner and outer rocks of Saunders's Ledge. Look down,—how clear the water is and how lovely the sea-weeds, above which we are floating, dark brown and purple fronds of the Ulvæ, and the long blades of the Laminaria with mossy green tufts between. As we issue from this narrow passage we must be on the watch, for the tide is rising, and may come laden with treasures, as it sweeps through it. A sudden cry from the oarsman at the bow, not of rocks or breakers ahead, but of "A new Jelly-fish astern!" The quick eye of the naturalist of the party pronounces it unknown to zoölogists, un-described by any scientific pen. Now what excitement! "Out with the net!—we have passed him! he has gone down! no, there he is again! back us a bit." Here he is floating close by us; now he is within the circle of the net, but he is too delicate to be caught safely in that way, so, while one of us moves the net gently about, to keep him within the space enclosed by it, another slips the glass bowl under him, lifts it quickly, and there is a general exclamation of triumph and delight,—we have him. And now we look more closely; yes, decidedly he is a novelty as well as a beauty. (See [Fig. 122], Ptychogena lactea A. Ag.) Those white mossy tufts for ovaries are unlike anything we have found before ([Fig. 123]), and not represented in any published figures of Jelly-fishes. We float about here for a while, hoping to find more of the same kind, but no others make their appearance, and we keep on our way to East Point, where there is a capital fishing ground for Medusæ of all sorts. Here two currents meet, and the Jelly-fishes are stranded as it were along the line of juncture, able to move neither one way nor the other. At this spot the sea actually swarms with life; one cannot dip the net into the water without bringing up Pleurobrachia, Bolina, Idyia, Melicertum, &c., while the larger Zygodactyla and Aurelia float about the boat in numbers. These large Jelly-fishes produce a singular effect as one sees them at some depth beneath the water; the Aureliæ, especially, with their large white disks, look like pale phantoms wandering about far below the surface; but they constantly float upward, and if not too far out of reach, one may bring them up by stirring the water under them with the end of the oar.
