428 



PARENTAL CARE AMONG FRESH-WATER FISHES. 



Here, for the present, the liistory of the Bichir's propagation ends. 

 Four sjDecial expeditions have been made and two excellent natu- 

 ralists — Harrington and Budgett — sacrificed their lives in the search 

 for further details. Another and more fortunate explorer must arise 

 before the full history of the fish is known and the extent to which 

 provision is made for eggs and young. 



Fig. 10. 



-l'olinJtvru8 8cncgaluii. Young with persistent external gills- 

 Steindacliner. 



After 



The Bichir is not oidy interesting from a scientific point of view, 

 for it may be considered as a food fish and is by no means a bad one. 

 Indeed, Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire claimed that its flesh is white and 

 much more savory than that of the other inhabitants of the Nile. 

 As the fish can not be readily cut with a knife, on account of its coat 

 of mail, it is put whole in the fire, and can then, after the limbs 

 have been cut out, be skinned and handled with ease. 



THE BOWFIN OR AMIA. 



One of the most interesting of the American fresh-water fishes is 

 that most commoidy known as the dogfish or mudfish, but to enable an 



Fig. 20. — Peculiar lieterocercal tail of the howfin. 



ordinary man to know what those names mean it is necessary to add 

 the Latin designation, Amia caloa. Its interest arises from the fact 

 that it has, like the gar-pikes (Lepidosteids), the merit, for the zoolo- 

 gist, of being the only survivor of an ancient type of fishes, and thus 

 preserving the records in flesh and bone of the details of stT'ucture as 

 well as habits characteristic of one of the old types. It is at once 



