2776 THE BONY FISHES AND GANOIDS 



evinced by the male fish. He kept constant watch over the nest, every now and 

 then shaking up the materials and dragging out the eggs, and then pushing them 

 into their receptacle again, and tucking them up with his snout, arranging the whole 

 to his mind, and again and again adjusting it till he was satisfied; after which he 

 hung or hovered over the surface of the nest, his head close to the orifice, the body 

 inclined upward at an angle of about 45, fanning it with the pectoral fins, aided by 

 a side motion of the tail. This curious manoeuvre was apparently for the purpose 

 of ventilating the spawn; at least by this means a current of Water was made to set 

 in toward the nest, as was evident by the agitation of particles of matter attached 

 to it. This fanning or ventilation was frequently repeated every day till the young 

 were hatched; and sometimes the fish would dive head foremost into his nursery 

 and bring out a mouthful of sand, which he would carry for some distance and dis- 

 charge with a puff. At the end of a month the young ones were first perceived. 

 The nest was built on the twenty-third of April, the young appearing first on May 

 21. Unremitting as had been the attention of this exemplary parent up to the time of 

 the hatching of the eggs, he now redoubled his assiduity. He never left the spot 

 either by day or night; and during the daytime he guarded it most pertinaciously, 

 allowing nothing to approach. . . . The fry were at first so minute and transparent 

 that they were scarcely perceptible, and it was only by a slight fluttering motion their 

 position could be occasionally discovered ; otherwise it was impossible to detect them. ' ' 

 Although the name of pipefishes is frequently applied to the mem- 

 bers of the second family of the group under consideration, it is better 

 to restrict that term to the Syngnathidce (described in the sequel), and take that of 

 flutemouths for those to be now noticed. As a family the flutemouths are readily 

 distinguished from the sticklebacks by the production of the bones of the muzzle 

 into a long tube, terminated by a small mouth; and likewise by the pelvic fins con- 

 sisting of six soft rays. The greatly-elongated body is either covered with very 

 small scales, or naked; the teeth are small; the first dorsal, if present, is formed of 

 small isolated spines; the soft dorsal and anal are of moderate length; the pelvic fins 

 consist of six rays, without any spine, and are separated from the pubic bones, 

 which remain attached to the pectoral arch; and there are five branchiostegal rays. 

 The air bladder is large, and the vertebrae are very numerous, those in the anterior 

 part of the column being fused into a continuous tube, as in the flying gurnards. 

 These fishes, which may be regarded as gigantic and highly-specialized marine 

 sticklebacks, frequent the coasts of the tropical and subtropical portions of the At- 

 lantic, Indian, and Pacific Oceans, some of them growing to from four to six feet in 

 length. In the genus Fistularia, the body is naked, the forked caudal fin has one 

 or two of its middle rays produced into a long whip-like filament, and there are no 

 isolated spines to the dorsal fin. The species are confined to the tropical Atlantic 

 and Indian Oceans. On the other hand, in the typical genus Aulostoma the body is 

 covered with small scales, the caudal fin squared, and without filaments, while the 

 back carries a series of small isolated spines, and the teeth are rudimentary. In 

 this genus the species inhabit the Atlantic; but the third genus (Auliscops} is 

 represented by a single form from the Pacific coast of this continent, distinguished 

 by the naked body, the thoracic position of the pelvic fins, and the presence of 



