122 TO DAVY JONES S LOCKER 



sea fish — Cyclothones or round-mouths, lanternfish, and 

 bronze eels. The former meant nothing at first; I took 

 them for dark-colored worms or shrimps. Only when I saw 

 them at greater depths in the searchlight did I recognize 

 them. Of all the many thousands of these fish which I have 

 netted, I never saw one alive until now (Plate VI). The 

 lanternfish (Myctophids) came close to the glass and were 

 easy to call by name (Fig. 51). Instead of having only 

 a half dozen scales left, like those caught in the nets, these 

 fish were ablaze with their full armor of iridescence. Twice 

 I caught the flash of their light organs, but only for an 

 instant. An absurdly small and rotund puffer appeared 

 quite out of place at this depth, but with much more 

 reason he probably thought the same of me. 



Big silvery bronze eels (Plate VIII) came nosing about 

 the bait, although what they expected to accomplish with 

 their exceedingly slender and delicate jaws is hard to 

 imagine. Their transparent larva also appeared, swimming 

 by itself, a waving sheet of watery tissue. Pale shrimps 

 drifted by, their transparency almost removing them from 

 vision. Now and then came a flash as from an opal, prob- 

 ably the strange, flat crustacean, well-named Sapphirina, 

 Ghosts of pilot-fish swam into view again at this level. 



Here, at 400 feet, we found that we could just read 

 ordinary print with an effort, and yet to the unfocused 

 eye the illumination seemed very brilliant. I found that 

 the two hours' difference between 10 a.m. and noon, mark- 

 ing the two dives, Numbers Four and Seven, although 



