46 SUPPLEMENT ON 



through the ice, the fish are more lively, and are sometimes 

 struck by the Indians ; and, it is asserted that, during hard 

 frosts, when drawn from beneath it, they freeze into a solid 

 mass of ice in a moment, and are almost as fragile ; yet that 

 they will revive even after many hours, if they are*carefully 

 placed in water. Experiments tried about New York on this 

 subject have not been crowned with success, because it was 

 believed the frost, which was to suspend animation, was not 

 sufficiently intense. That ice in the stomach even of a reptile 

 will not destroy life, is admitted in the United States, where 

 rattle-snakes are not unfrequently found in the winter, torpid, 

 and with their food undigested and completely frozen within 

 them, yet liable to become vivacious with the least increase 

 of temperature ; and digestion recommencing as if no sus- 

 pension of the animal functions had interposed. These 

 phenomena are therefore common to many species of fish, to 

 several serpents, as well as to tritons. 



But all these varieties of powers and habits are chiefly the 

 result of conformation, and it would be vain to attempt to 

 account for them, without first studying in detail the structure 

 of all the parts of fish, the differences which distinguish this 

 structure from that of other vertebrated animals, and the 

 modifications it receives in the various families, genera and 

 species. It is therefore necessary to form at least an abstract 

 notion of the parts of fish, both with regard to external form 

 and internal conformation : the bones, the muscles, the organs 

 of the senses, of circulation, of reproduction, &c. must be 

 examined, before a competent acquaintance can be obtained 

 of the animal organization, modified as we find it in fishes. 



