ancient observers wondered at its peculiar shape, 

 just as do the majority of the moderns; thus, from 

 their day to this it retains the name Hippocampus, 

 from the Greek hippos, horse, and kampe, meaning 

 caterpillar, or worm — the two derivations refer- 

 ring respectively to its head and tail. Indeed, as 

 one writer has aptly remarked, if a coiled worm 

 were attached to the base of the piece known to 

 chess players as the knight (an object which the 

 head of a sea-horse more nearly resembles than it 

 does the head of even a horse) , the common hippo- 

 campid would be well imitated. 



But these are only superficial resemblances. A 

 fish has no neck; what passes for a "neck," is really 

 the abdomen; therefore, there is no true corre- 

 spondence between the contracted part of the hip- 

 pocampi d' s body adjoining the head, and the neck 

 of a horse proper. 



The head of Hippocampus, in front of the eyes, 

 is prolonged into a sort of snout; it is a tube, in 

 fact, bearing at its tip the extremely small mouth 

 and jaws which are numbered among the many 

 strange modifications of this creature's structure. 

 The eyes themselves are prominent, but owing to 

 the circumstance that the iris partakes of the color 



[276] 



