CUAP. II.] 



MADEIRA TO THE COAST OF BRAZIL. 



83 



J/. 



from one side to tlie other. All our specimens were perfectly 

 symmetrical, and as they ranged from one to tliree centimetres 

 in length, many of them were far 

 beyond the stage in which the 

 wandering of the eye is described 

 by Steenstrup, and seemed rather 

 to favor the view that there is a 

 group of pelagic fshes, which — 

 while presenting all the general 

 features of the Pleuronectidse — 

 never undergo that peculiar twist- 

 ing which brings the two eyes of 

 the flounder or turbot to the same 

 side of the head, and is evidently 

 in immediate relation with the 

 mode of life of these animals, 

 which feed and swim with the 

 body closely applied to the sea- 

 bottom. 



On the 21st of August we 

 sounded in 2450 fathoms, with a 

 bottom of brownish mud, evident- 

 ly colored by the debris from some 

 of the small rivers on the African 



^,^,„j. ,, ^<. „, +K„,, (AA '^ T Fig. 22. — Pyrocistis fusifunnis, Mukrw. 



coast, not more than 400 miles dlS- j,^.„,„ ,,^ ^^.^^^^ i„ the Guinea current. 



tant. A temperature sounding at O"*' hundred times the natural size. 



every 100 fathoms down to 1500 showed that we were still in 

 the Guinea Current. About midday we fell in with the edge of 

 the south-east trades, and we shaped our course to the westward. 



The depth on the 22d was 2475 fathoms, and the bottom 

 temperature 1°'6 C. The position of this station was 738 miles 

 to the eastward of St. Paul's Rocks. 



The trawl was sent down on the 23d to a depth of 2500 fath- 

 oms, with a bottom of globigerina ooze ; and during its absence 



