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From the moment they are poured into their ring of a tank the shoal of one hundred little herring swim in one direction only. There must be moments during that arrival when they could go either way: clockwise or the other way. But once decided no fish swims the wrong way. It is an impossibility. They go, go, go, go together, a unit, defended by unity. In a year their circuit makes up five thousand, two hundred kilometres and never ever does an individual show error, though some die, malfunction, lose rhythm, are then nipped, shunted, eaten alive by the swimming shoal. No demonstration, no accidental journey is therefore possible among the captive host of silver darlings. So take just one, drop it into another tank, one where the herring are swimming the other way. Having immediately fallen into line the newcomer will perceive no difference. Everything seems the same as before its migration: its shoalmates, the curve of the tank, the silver chase, the rules it thoughtlessly swims by. Wildness may be thought to offer depths and open seas. But no. It is the same there. Except that when unobserved there is no possibility of shame. Nets empty the sea anyway, until just one slipped-away silver darling swims alone, though still clenched with the idea of the shoal, of defence, of unity, though all is lost and always was. |