SLICKING FOR FLYINGFISHES 



of solidity which left me no adequate reason for not 

 stepping over the gunwale and walking off. With 

 such a halo as I perceived when I saw the vision of 

 myself I could surely attain the aquatic pedestrian 

 ability of Saint Peter. 



Although the slick was so wide, there was very 

 little sargassum weed in it — a patch here and there 

 with a multitude of isolated berrylike floats. In the 

 slight wash of our slow-moving boat these bobbed 

 about, which was natural and to be expected ; but as 

 I watched, net in hand, for the appearance of some 

 fish, I saw two berries behaving as no proper sar- 

 gassum berries should. They anticipated the bow 

 ripple, and bobbed and moved before they or any 

 other member of the vegetable kingdom had any 

 right to. The suspicions of naturalists and policemen 

 are always easily aroused, and nervous, acrobatic 

 berries appealed to my collecting instinct as keenly 

 as veritable fish. So I scooped one up, washed him 

 into a bottle and saw my first, wild-caught, newly 

 hatched flyingfish. 



The scales now fallen from my eyes, I became 

 more exocoetropic — which means that I went after 

 my infant flyingfish with renewed enthusiasm born 

 of increased intelligence. Within five minutes I 

 learned why naturalists are acutely conceited and 

 chronically humble, for I skillfully captured and 

 bottled five perfectly good sargassum berries and al- 

 lowed four of the fish mimics to pass out of reach. 



Somewhat larger flyingfish now appeared, about 

 a third of an inch in length, slightly too elongate to 



59 



