278 Mr. E. W. Gudger on the 



Hexameron *, Homily VII. paragraph 56, lie writes : u If 

 now you hear say that the greatest vessels sailing with full 

 sails are easily stopped by a very small fish, by the Remora, 

 and so forcibly that the ship remains motionless for a long 

 time, as if it had taken root in the middle of the sea, do you 

 not see in this little creature a like proof of the power of the 

 creator ? " 



St. Ambrose (340-397) in his l Hexameron/ the first 

 edition of which bears the imprint Basileae, 1566, describes 

 Echinus (probably a misspelling of Echeneis) as a foreteller 

 of storms. " At the approach of a tempest the fish lays hold 

 of a rock and sticks fast to it until calm weather returns. 

 The sailors, noting this, govern themselves accordingly." 

 This is probably an echo of Aristotle's little fish found 

 among rocks, and seems to be the first of a long succession 

 of similar stories, ascribing to this fish weather-forecasting 

 powers. St. Ambrose, however, does not seem to give the 

 ship-holding story. 



Jorath, who was probably an Oriental Christian of the 

 twelfth century, speaks of a fish called Achandes which 

 sticks fast to ships in the sea, thus making them to stand 

 stock still f. 



About the year 1250, Bartholomew Anglicus wrote his 

 encyclopedic work f De Proprietatibus Rebus,' which was 

 translated by John Trevisa in 1397, and printed at Win- 

 chester in 1491. The following is his interesting account 

 of the ship-holder, for which also I am indebted to the 

 kindness of Dr. Eastman : — 



" Enchirius is a little fish unneth [ oni y] half a foot long ; 

 for though he be full little of body, nathless he is most of 

 virtue. For he cleaveth to the ship, and holdeth it still 

 steadfastly in the sea, as though the ship were on ground 

 therein. Tho' winds Moav, and waves rise strongly, and 

 wood [violent] storms, that ship may not move nother 

 [neither] pass. And that fish holdeth not still the ship by 

 no craft but only by cleaving to the ship." 



In 1475, Johaun von Cuba (or Cube) published at Metz 

 his ' Hortus Sanitatis.' In the edition of 1536 on page 78 

 of chapter 34 he discourses of Echeneis or Echinus. This, 



* " Hexameron is the title of nine homilies delivered by St. Basil on 



the cosmogony of the opening chapters of Genesis Basil read 



the hook of Genesis in the light of scientific knowledge of his day." 

 He was born in 329 and died in his fiftieth year. 



f For this reference I am indebted to Dr. Eastman, who ran across it 

 on page 71 of Von Cuba's 'Hortus Sanitatis/ to which reference will be 

 made later. 



