282 ACANTHOPT. THE WRISTED FAMILY. 



very generally been asserted that these fishes, owing 

 to the smallness of the gill-opening, can live long 

 out of the water. This statement has been far 

 too generally made, and hence M. Valenciennes has 

 thought fit to meet it with the declaration that he 

 has seen no proof that any of the genus Lophius, 

 to which the famous Fishing-frog belongs, are tena- 

 cious of life ; on the contrary, he has seen many 

 expire, on being captured, more rapidly than the 

 Breams, Gurnards, and other fishes which were 

 taken along with them. That a statement of this 

 sort should have received somewhat too wide an ap- 

 plication, was almost to be expected by those who 

 know how little discrimination is wont to be used in 

 distinguishing the different genera of a family. What, 

 then, is not true of one genus, may still be quite 

 correct respecting another. Of the Chironectes, the 

 fact remains uncontradicted; and under such peculiar 

 circumstances, as to call for remark. The respective 

 position of their ventrals as before, and their pecto- 

 rals as behind, and the foot-stalks upon which these 

 latter are supported, give them very much the ap- 

 pearance of having four feet; and it being the 

 ventrals which represent the fore feet or arms, the 

 employment of the four extremities is altogether 

 inverted. These limbs, along with the small gill- 

 opening, allow these fish to remain a long while in 

 the free air; and they avail themselves of this 

 power to crawl upon the sea-weed and mud, and 

 so, according to various authorities, to pursue their 

 prey. In some of the muddy estuaries on the north 



