OCEAN CURRENTS 179 



schooners from Gloucester and other New England ports. 

 It belongs to a group of fishes that inhabit warmer seas, 

 and this tile -fish apparently frequents the western edge of 

 the Gulf Stream in moderately deep water at a temperature 

 of about 50° F. Specimens caught and examined were 

 found to be gorged with a large species of Amphipod 

 {Themisto bispinosus). 



In the spring of 1882 incoming vessels reported that 

 tile-fish were seen in countless milHons floating upon the 

 surface of the ocean, in a dead or dying condition, and 

 covering thousands of square miles. A full account of 

 the matter, as then known, was given in a report by Captain 

 J. W. ColHns, published by the United States Commission of 

 Fish and Fisheries for 1882. 



The dead fish were found over an area measuring 170 

 miles in a north-easterly and south-westerly direction, 

 with an average width of at least 25 miles. Captain 

 CoUins estimated the area occupied at from 5,000 to 7,000 

 square miles, and that the number of dead fish must have 

 exceeded a bilhon. The fishing schooner " Navarino," in 

 March, 1882, reported having sailed through the sea, thickly 

 scattered over with the dead fish as far as the eye could 

 reach, for two days and a night, for a distance of at least 

 150 miles. Thousands of the fish were seen close together 

 near to the vessel, and these were from 2 to 4 feet in 

 length. The general opinion among the fishermen and 

 others at the time seemed to be that the fish were killed 

 by some submarine volcanic eruption or other great con- 

 vulsion of nature. Captain Collins estimated from reports 

 of the various fishing boats that there must have been 

 about 256,000 dead fish in the square mile, and that at a 

 low estimate about a thousand milUon pounds weight of 

 edible fish were destroyed on that occasion. 



The opinion is expressed in this official report that the 

 tile-fish encountered a layer of unusually cold water, which 

 paralysed and rendered them helpless to such an extent 



