FISHES. 



217 



quently found three or four feet in lenpfth. The fish occa- 

 sionally attains a length of more than twelve feet, and a weight 

 of more than four hundred pounds. It is said to entertain 

 great hostility to tht; whale ; and some of them will joirf in 

 stabbing it below, while the Fox-sharks will fling then. selves 

 several yards into the air, and descend upon the back of their 

 unhappy victim. It is a commonly-received notion, that it is 

 in consequence of mistaking the hull of a ship at sea for a 

 whale that the Sword-fish occasionally thrusts his sword-like 

 beak into the vessel.* 



Fig. 189.— SWOKD-FISH. 



The force with which this is done must be very considerable : 

 many museums contain planks thus pierced either by the 

 Sword-fish or others nearly allied to it. A portion of its 

 sword, about nine inches in length and two inches diameter, 

 was sent to the Belfast Museum.t taken from the Euphemia, 

 a vessel which had become leaky on her passage to Brazil. It 

 had been driven not only through the copper sheathing, but 

 also through nine inches of the solid timbers. Other instances 

 are recorded of vessels having suddenly sprung a leak, and 

 being with difficult}' got into port, the Sword-fish havhig been 

 the origin of the calamity. 





FlR. 190.— Electric Silubus 



But a still more remarkable mode of defence is exercised by 



some species of fish, in the power they possess of giving a 



severe electric shock. One of these is the Electric Silurus or 



Malepterunis of the Nile {Fig. 190), a fish to which the Arabs 



• Tarrell, p. 145. 



t Thompson, ia Annals of Natural Histon*, vol. xiii. p. 235. 



