Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1877-11-28
The StickIeback Bell Ringers.
by G. f. HOLDER.

A certain pond in the country was once
peopled with Il number Of turtles, frogs
and fishes which came to consider my
pets, and which at last grew so tame that
fed them from my hands. Among them,
however, were four or five little Sickle
backs that lived under the shade of big
willow, and these were so quarrelsome
| generally fed them apart from the rest.
But sometimes all met, and then the feast
usually was ended by the death of min
now. For, shocking to say, whenever
there was a dispute for the food, some one
of the little fishes was almost sure to be
devoured by the hungry slicklebacks.
These stickleback-an minnow combats,
after while, came to be Of daily occur
renee and the reason for this was a singu-
lar one, which must eXpl lin.
Under the willow shade, and from one
of the branches, | had hung miniature
"belfry," containing tiny brass bell and
had let the string into the water, letting il
90 down to II considerable depth. At first
tied bait ut intervals upon the line, and
the sticklebacks, of course, seized upon it,
and thus rang the bell. Generally the
ringing was done in very grave and
proper way, although sometimes. when
the bait was too tightly tied, the quick
peals sounding like IL call to a fire.
| kept up this system of batting the
string for about II week, until thought
they understood it, and then replaced the
worms by bits of stones. As | expected,
the next morning, as | looked through
the grass and down into the water, tnkle
tinkle rang the bell, and knew my little
friends were saying, Good morning!
and expected breakfast. You may be
sure they got it | put my hand down,
and up they came, and got one worm
apiece; and as | raised my hand, down
they rushed and away went the bell, in in
uproarious peal, that must have startled
the whole neighborhood. | was Qnick to
respond and they soon learned to ring the
bell before coming to the surface; in fact,
if they saw me pass, | always heard theil
welcome greeting. Rnt to return to the
minnows.
generally fed them first, about twenty
feet up the bank; but one morning found
one or two had followed me down TO the
residence of the stickleback family. They
met with rude reception, however, and
to avoid making trouble, the next day
went to the willow first But no sooner
had the bell begun to ring than l saw Il
lot of ripples coming down, and in a sec.
ond the two factions were in mortal COM
bat The stcklebacks were fighting not
only for breakfast, but for their nests
which were near by; and they made sad
work of the poor minnows, who, though
smart in some things, did not know when
they were whipped, and SO kept up the
fight, though losing one of their number
nearly every morning. The bell now and
then rang violently, but fear it was only
sounding an appeal from voraciOus stick
leback whose appetite had got the better
of his rage.
So it went on every morning. The
minnows had learned what the bell meant
and though usually defeated in the flight,
they in reality had their betters us servants
to ring the bell and call them to meals
Finally, they succeeded by force of great
numbers, in driving away their pugnaci-
Gus little rivals, and the bell hung silent
for, strange to say, they knew what the
sound meant, but l could never teach
them to ring it, when they could rise and
steal the worm from my hand without.
But | am inclined TO think it was more
laziness than inability to learn, ms they af-
terward picked up readily some much
more difficult tricks. | taught them to
leap from the water into my hand, and lie
us if dead and having arranged IL slide OF