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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



movable spine at the base of the tail we may merely mention the 

 herbivorous lancet-fish, although in its general outline it is scarcely 

 more remarkable than a perch or a bream. 



'"Sea-ravens" {Hemipterua^ Fig. 23), "sea-robins" (Frio)iotus), 

 " sea-swallows " [Dactylopterus), and sculpins ( Coitus)^ may well be 

 called strange fishes, for their forms are so marked and so strange that 

 they at once arrest the attention of the commonest observer at the 



Fig. 23 Sea-Raven (iZeffiJ;><ers ^mrfiawM*, Storer). Fig. 34. Star-Gazer (Crawo.'copws 



anoplos, Cuviei). 



sea-side. While all these have a certain general resemblance to one 

 another, all agreeing in being remarkably ugly, each has its own 

 marked peculiarities in -the development of the head and fins, and in 

 the curious fleshy filaments which are found upon some of them. 



We may also justly include the little star-gazers ( Uranoscopiis, 

 Fig. 24) of the Atlantic, whose eyes are so placed that they appear as 

 if looking constantly toward the heavens, and whose mouth is cleft 

 vertically, and has in it a long filament wliich can be protruded at 

 will, and which is said to be used in attracting small fishes while the 

 owner lies concealed in the mud. 



Next we may mention the remora (Fig. 25), on whose head there 

 is a sort of disk composed of laminae which are serrated and movable, 

 by means of which the fish can firmly attach itself to other animals. 



Fig. 25. Remora (,Echeneis). 



It is said that it can be made useful by putting a ring attached to a 

 line around its tail, and then allowing it to swim away in searcli of a 

 victim ; when it has firmly attached itself to a fish, both the remora 

 and its captive are hauled in together. 



Remarkable and strancre as are all the forms of fishes which we 

 have so far noticed, not one of them exhibits any want of bilateral 

 symmetry. But we now come to a whole group of fishes, including 



