312 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES [24] 
and is here quoted. The skepticism of this author is sometimes a little 
too sweeping, but is in general judicious: 
“ This fish is found in the North Sea and the Baltic, but is rare in 
those waters. In the Mediterranean, however, it is very abundant. It 
lives for the most part in the Atlantic, where in winter it is found in 
mid-ocean In spring it appears on the coast of Sicily, where its eggs 
are deposited on the bottom in great numbers. However, according to 
what I have been told by the illustrious Chevalier Hamilton, it is never 
seen in that region more than three or four feet long. The larger ones, 
often weighing four or five hundred pounds, and eighteen to twenty feet 
long, are found on the coast of Calabria, where they appear in June and 
July. Pliny remarked that they often exceed the dolphin in size. * * * 
‘Various writers have spoken of the ‘ Emperor of the Sea’ as occur- 
ring in the Baltic. Olearius and Schelhammer record its capture near 
Holstein; Schoneveld mentions one from Mecklenburg ; Walbaum one 
from the vicinity of Liibeck; Hanover and Klein one from the vicinity 
of Danzig; Hartmann one from near Pillau; and Wolf another taken 
near Konigsberg. 
«One mentioned by Schoneveld as taken near Mecklenburg was so 
large that it required two strong horses to draw it from the water. The 
body, without the sword, was eleven feet long, the sword three. The 
eyes were as large as hens’ eggs, and the tail was two feet broad. Of 
four seen by Professor Koelpin during his stay at Greifswald, one meas- 
ured more than three and one-half feet in circumference. * * * 
“ These fish, according to the story of the Chevalier Hamilton, always 
appear in pairs as they approach Messina, a female and a male together.” 
[Then follows a description of the method of capture, very similar to 
that given below in paragraph 56.| 
“This fish lives upon marine plants andgfish. It has such a terrible 
defensive weapon that other voracious fishes do not dare to attack it. 
According to Aristotle, it is, like the tunny, tormented by an insect, and 
in its fury leaps out of the sea and even into vessels. According to 
Statius Miiller, the skin is phosphorescent at night. Although such 
large fishes are not usually well flavored, this one is considered palata- 
ble. Pieces of the belly and the tail are especially esteemed, and hence 
they are expensive. The fins are salted and sold under the name 
SCAU Oee veg te 
‘‘Aelian errs in saying that it enters fresh water, and in cataloguing it 
among the fishes of the Danube. 
*¢ Oppian and Ovid consider it, on account of its sword, one of the most 
terrible denizens of the sea. It is not at all probable that, as Pliny and 
many other later ichthyologists have written, it pierces the sides of ves- 
sels with its sword and sends them to the bottom ; its sword is not suffi- 
ciently strong. 
“Salviani, who gave the first figure of the fish, was wrong, like many 
writers who followed him, in giving two dorsal and two anal fins. 
