pleasing and wanton Sirens, with disturbing breasts and harmonious voices. The 

 chariot of Aphrodite sailed on the blue waves surrounded by a procession of husky 

 Tritons blowing into deep-toned conch shells. 



The story of Christianity began on the shores of Lake Tiberias. Jesus recruited 

 his first disciples from out-of-work fishermen and quickened their dawning faith by 

 the miraculous draught of fishes. With a few loaves and fishes he fed the multitude 

 who listened to his prophecy. The symbol " Ichthus " which adorns the tombs of 

 the martyrs doubtless has an older significance than that of a lately invented Greek 

 monogram. The fish calls to mind the life-giving purity of water, whence comes 

 baptism. 



The Arab navigators voyaged all over the Indian Ocean as merchants, traders, 

 pirates or slave-traders. In the entrancing travel stories which figure among the Tales 

 of the Thousand and One Nights, they give a great place to the sea and to unknown 

 isles and fishes. Many of these animals are kindly genii. In exchange for their 

 liberty they lead the fisherman who has captured them into the deep, where wonderful 

 treasures are hidden in crystalline caves. 



In Hawaii, Tonga and New Zealand the Maoris honour the heru Maui, who 

 fished for islands in the Great Ocean. Sometimes he dragged them one after the other 

 from the bosom of the deep and so made archipelagos. But the island to the South 

 of New Zealand was pulled out in one fell swoop : it is " Te-ika-a-Maui ", the fish of 

 Maui. The brothers of the god, against his orders, wished to dismember it and the 

 slashes of their knives are still marked by deep valleys. The Polynesian world is 

 bound to marine life and numerous symbols have been taken from coral fishes. 



In various parts of the world primitive tribes have taken the salmon as a totem 

 embodying both beauty and courage. It has not lost its prestige among the Indian 

 tribes of Northern British Columbia and large, strikingly-coloured figures carved 

 in wood still decorate the reserves in Canada. Similarly, this magnificent fish was 

 the tutelary god of the Corisopites who lived in the Quimper region of Armorica. 

 Breton hagiography has personified this memory in St Corentin, the first bishop of 

 the ith Century, who lived near a river. At meal-times the saintly man called to a pet 

 salmon and after cutting off a slice of flesh he put the fish back in the water, when the 

 wound immediately disappeared. One day when King Gradlon had lost his way 

 with his retinue in the forest of Kranou, St Corentin, thanks to the miraculous fish, 

 was easily able to feed this band of hungry hunters. In Bussia, neither Christianity 

 nor Communism have superseded rustic beliefs and in the traditional poems called 

 bylinas, the bogatyr Volkh, the god of the Volga, changes into a great and mighty pike. 



Fishes have come out of the legendary sphere, although old sailors still tell very 

 strange tales to wile away the time on long voyages. But ichthyology has become a 

 science and we must leave the realm of the marvellous for the reality of technical precision. 

 To take our readers on a journey, we have given our biological remarks a geographical 

 setting. From North to South they will pass from arctic seas to temperate and tropical 

 regions, and having crossed, the line, will become acquainted with marine life under 

 the Southern Cross before descending into the great depths. This book is very incom- 

 plete. Many fishes find no place in it, but we have no intention of drawing up a 

 catalogue of 30,000 known species. 



