102 ITS ADHESIVE POWEE. 



occasionally varied with sliglit cloudings of a deeper 

 tint of tlie same colour. At other times, when lying 

 still, the body is of a x^ale pellucid brown, with drab 

 clouds, and patches of white specks. The first 

 dorsal is always of an orange-fawn colour. The eyes 

 are striking, being of a pale blue, exactly like two 

 turquoises. 



It is a characteristic of the fishes of this genus that 

 the ventral fins are soldered together, as it were, by 

 their inner edges, so as to form an oval disk. The 

 object of this is the adhesion of the body by means 

 of a vacuum. Colonel Montagu, indeed, says of this 

 species, — " In no instance have we observed that they 

 adhered either to rocks or to the bottom of the glass 

 vessel in which they have been kept alive for several 

 days."* But I have seen the Black Goby adhering to 

 the glass sides of my Aquarium by its ventral sucker 

 repeatedly, though not imtil it had become familiar- 

 ized to its home by several weeks' captivity. 



THE GREY MULLET. 



Some half-dozen Mullet-fry, from an inch to an 

 inch and a quarter long, proved very hardy, surviving 

 apparently uninjured, even when the exudations from 

 the putty and paint killed everything else, even the 

 Actiniae, before the Tank was seasoned. I attribute 

 this immunity to their constant habit of keeping at the 

 sm'face, where the water becomes perpetually aerated ; 

 for they rarely descend far below this, but play day 

 and night at the top of the water. They are social 



* MS. quoted in Yarrell's Br. Fishes, i. 283. 



