24 A NATURALIST 'S WANDERINGS 





fas thev do often) on the surface of 

 tlie water; their jaws are armed with formidable solid teeth to 

 enable them to feed on the coral ; and the File-fishes, painted 

 with ccerulean bands and harnessed with blue bridle-lines, 

 which not only feed on the coral, but bore their way through 

 the shells of MoUusca to extract the sncculent morsels within. 

 Their bodies terminate in a most convenient-looking tail, as 

 if made purposely to handle them by, and I could not help 

 feeling maliciously imposed on when I did so, by havin 



or 



very precipitately to drop a fine specimen I waf* lifting for 

 examination, on the sharp hidden spines, with which that 

 organ is set, running into my hand like a series of lances. 

 One of the commonest genera of fishes in the tropical seas 

 of the Atlantic, Anstralian and Indo-Pacific regions is the 

 Chxtodon, Nvhich is particularly attractive on account of the 

 form and the singular brilliance of the coloration of its species. 

 The heaps offish that my boys, a couple of urchins not more 

 than four years of age, used, by alternately harpooning and 

 diving after them to bring in, formed when piled on the white 

 background of the coral shore, a bright picture indeed from 

 the wonderful variety of their colours — emerald-green, cobalt- 

 blue, rich orange, and even scarlet. 



3Iost of the lagoon fishes are good for food ; but there 

 is a species of Scarus which requires to be prepared for the 

 table with very great care, for should the gall-bladder be 

 ruptured, and its contents escape into the body-cavity, the 

 flesh of the fish becomes quite poisoned. Several fatal cases 

 had occurred in the settlement, especially among children, 

 who almost immediately after partaking of the flesh were 

 seized with giddiness and stupor, followed by death, with a 

 dropsical state of the body, within two or three honrs. The 

 efi^ect of the application of the bile externally produced simply 

 a bad fester. A woman while cleaning such a fish by the shore, 

 on one occasion threw out the entrails on the water, when a 

 Frigate-bird {Tachjipetes minor) which had been hovering over 

 her, swooping down picked up the tempting morsel ; but it 

 had risen only some thirty feet in the air, when it fell back on 

 the water lifeless. The sharks, i\m albacore {Thynnus termo) 

 and the baracuta are the pirates of the lagoon, and the chief 

 agents in restraining its over-population. 



