2848 THE BONY FISHES AND GANOIDS 



likewise found in Siberia. In Lapland it extends even beyond the limits of the 

 birch, while to the south it is common in the Venetian lagoons. Growing very 

 rapidly, the pike not uncommonly attains a length of forty-five or forty-six inches, 

 with a weight of thirty-five or thirty-six pounds; and although fishes of much 

 larger dimensions are on record, the accounts of these must be received with great 

 caution. It is pretty well ascertained that fish of forty-five inches are not com- 

 monly more than about fifteen years old, and the stories of examples living for a 

 century, or even more, appear to be legendary. Pike are among the most predaceous 

 and greedy of all fresh-water fish, nothing coming amiss to their voracious appe- 

 tites, since not only will they devour worms, leeches, frogs, trout, carp, and other 

 fishes, but they pull under the young, and often even the adults, of all kinds of 

 water birds, and have no objection to an occasional water vole. Their habit of lying 

 like a log in the water (from which trait they probably derive their name), as well 

 as the sudden rush they make after their prey, are well known to all; and the dam- 

 age these fish do to trout streams is almost incredible. Pike are also great devour- 

 ers of the smaller members of their own kind. Frequenting alike ponds, lakes, and 

 rivers, pike in Ireland spawn as early as February, but in England a month or two 

 later, while in some parts of the Continent the season lasts till May. Males, which 

 are inferior in size to their consorts, are said to be more numerous than the latter; 

 and it is not uncommon for a female in spawning time to be attended by three or 

 four members of the opposite sex, who crowd around her as she lies quiet to deposit 

 her eggs. 



THE AFRICAN BEAKED FISH Family 



The very remarkable fish (Mormyrus petersi} shown in the upper figure of the 

 illustration on page p. 2849, is the best known African representative of a large 

 genus of fresh-water fishes confined to Africa, and constituting not only a family 

 but likewise a distinct section, to which Professor Cope applies the name of Scy- 

 phophori. Having the narrow parietal bones of the skull distinct both from one 

 another and from the supraoccipital, these fishes are especially distinguished by 

 having each of the pterotics (which lie on each side of the parietals) large, funnel 

 shaped, and inclosing a cavity expanding externally, and covered by a lid-like plate 

 of bone. The anterior vertebrae are simple and unmodified; and a subopercular 

 bone is present in the gill cover. Externally both the body and tail are covered 

 with scales, but the head is naked, and the muzzle has no barbels. In the upper 

 jaw the middle portion is formed by the united premaxillae, and the sides by 

 the maxillae; the gill opening is reduced to a small slit; there are no false gills; and 

 the air bladder is simple. A fatty fin is wanting; and whereas in the typical genus 

 all the other fins are well developed, in the allied Gymnarchus (which is likewise 

 exclusively African, and is sometimes regarded as the representative of a distinct 

 family) the caudal, anal, and pelvic fins are wanting, the tail tapering to a point, 

 instead of terminating in a deeply forked fin. The beaked fishes are divided into 

 groups according to the length of the dorsal fin and the form of the muzzle, the 



