THIRTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT 108 
The color plates painted with the use of the portable aquarium 
may, therefore, be classed with the photographs made by the 
same method. They show phases of color and markings ex- 
hibted by specimens more or less affected by fright. The plates 
reproduced from paintings of fresh, but rapidly fading dead speci- 
mens, may, if very quickly done, show color phases resulting 
from fright. Otherwise they can show only tints resulting from 
the slow relaxation of the color cells as the dying fish loses con- 
trol of them. 
While paintings and photographs of fishes made in the ways 
described above may present very well the colors and markings 
known to professional fishermen and to anglers—that is, colors 
exhibited by captured and frightened or dying specimens—the 
most of those with which we are acquainted do not portray the 
various species in the phases in which they exhibit themselves in 
lines 
All illustrations of fishes which are capable of sudden changes 
in color should, with a view to scientific exactness, be accom- 
panied with data respecting the phases of color shown, and the 
methods used in producing them. Color plates should never be 
made from dead fishes if living examples can be procured. It is 
equally important that similar data should accompany written 
descriptions of colors. The keeping of tropical fishes in public 
aquariums has now made possible some knowledge of their colors 
under normal conditions. In written descriptions in general, the 
familiar caption “Color i life,” is inexact, since it usually means 
merely the changing colors of a dying specimen. 
It does not appear that there is any phase of color in the twen- 
ty-six species under observation, which can be called the per- 
manent life color; frequent changes take place dependent upon 
activity, rest, play, anger, fright, temperature, food, light, or 
other causes. There are usually two or three phases of common 
occurrence, others being of less frequent appearance. The color 
changes are not necessarily connected with the breeding season, 
since they can be observed daily throughout the year. 
In the following notes no attempt has been made to write out 
new systematic descriptions of each species, the object in view 
being merely to direct attention to the facts that all of the 
fishes observed have different colors and markings at different 
times, that most of the phases have been hitherto undescribed, 
that the changes from one phase to another are sudden, and to 
state briefly the general character of each phase. 
