466 SUPPLEMENT ON 



most all warm and temperate latitudes, especially between the 

 tropics ; sometimes even it appears in the channel, when the 

 ocean is greatly agitated by tempests. Its manners are the 

 same as those of the Dactylopterus already noticed, and 

 it runs the same risk alternately in the water and in the 

 air. 



Almost all persons who have travelled by sea have had 

 occasion to observe the fishes of this species rising into the 

 air by thousands at once, and in all possible directions. 

 Their flight carries them fifteen or eighteen feet out of the 

 water. But it is an error to call them fly in y-Jishes : they do 

 not in reality fly ; they only leap into the air, where they have 

 not the power of sustaining themselves at will. They never 

 come forth from the water, except after a rapid course of 

 swimming. When put alive into a bucket of sea-water, 

 they were only able to rise out of it a few inches. The lines 

 which they traverse, when they enjoy full liberty of motion, 

 are very low curves, and always in the direction of their 

 progress in the water. 



The dorades, the squali, and the sea-birds, such as the 

 frigates and the phaetons destroy numbers of these exocceti. 

 They themselves feed on mollusca, and any small fish. 

 Their flesh has an agreeable flavour, and is often used by 

 mariners in long voyages. 



The exoccetus esiliens, whose flesh is fat and delicate, and 

 which habitually feeds on worms and vegetable substances, 

 is found in the sea of Arabia and in the Mediterranean, espe- 

 cially in the environs of the mouth of the Rhone. It is also 

 found in all parts of the ocean neighbouring to the tropics. 

 It shoots to more considerable distances than the preceding 

 species. 



Our observations on the family of the SiLURiDiE must be 

 confined to the Silurus. The species giants inhabits the 



