224 



AMERICAN FISHES. 



fish." They are occasionally taken in lobster-pots. When cruising in 

 Fish Commission yacht "Mollie," off Noman's Land, July 13, 1875, we 

 observed numerous specimens swimming under floating spars and planks. 

 Sometimes as many as from fifty to seventy-five were obseryed under a 

 single spar, a cloud of shadowy black forms being plainly visible from the 

 deck. We went out to them in a row-boat and succeeded in taking 

 thirteen of them in the course of a day. After the first thrusts of the dip- 

 net they grew shy and sought refuge under the boat, under which they 

 would sink far below our reach. A lull of a few moments would bring 

 them back to the log under which they had clustered until disturbed again. 

 When the boat was rowed away they followed in a close-swimming school 

 until we gained full speed, when they suddenly turned, as if by one im- 

 pulse, and swam back to the log or spar. Once they followed us about 

 two hundred yards from the spar, and then leaving us retreated to their 

 old shelter, reaching it some time before we could turn the boat and row 

 back to it. I had before this supposed them to be quite unusual, but on 

 that one day we must have seen, at the lowest computation, two hundred 

 or two hundred and fifty. They doubtless have been given the name of 

 Rudder-fish by the sailors who have seen them swimming about the sterns 

 of becalmed vessels. 







. " .v-_ f,; ;,*• - •<< if*^A.<r^.. ■ 



4 

 ■1 



THE BLACK RUDDER-FISH. 



When the Fish Commission steamer has been dredging off Halifax, I 

 have several times noticed schools of them hovering around her sides. 

 They doubtless gather around the logs for the purpose of feeding upon the 

 hydroids and minute crustaceans, and perhaps mollusca which accumulate 



