460 PLINY'S NATURAL HISTORY. [Book IX. 



which is even poisonous by the very touch, and immediately 

 produces vomiting and disarrangement of the stomach. In 

 our seas it has the appearance of a shapeless mass, and only 

 resembles the hare in colour ; in India it resembles it in its 

 larger size, and in its hair, which is only somewhat coarser : 

 there it is never taken alive. An equally deadly animal is the 

 sea-spider, 68 which is especially dangerous for a sting which it 

 has on the back : but there is nothing that is more to be dreaded 

 than the sting which protrudes from the tail of the trygon, 70 

 by our people known as the pastinaca, a weapon five inches in 

 length. Fixing this in the root of a tree, the fish is able to 

 kill it ; it can pierce armour too, just as though with an arrow, 

 and to the strength of iron it adds all the corrosive qualities of 

 poison. 



CHAP. 73. (49.) THE MALADIES OF FISHES. 



"We do not find it stated that all kinds of fishes are subject 

 to epizootic diseases, 71 like other animals of a wild nature : 



the muzzle and ears of the hare, closely enough to have caused this appellation. 

 As its smell is disagreeable, and its figure repulsive, a multitude of mar- 

 vellous, and indeed fatal qualities, he says, have been ascribed to this animal, 

 which fishermen still speak of, but which, nevertheless, are not confirmed by 

 actual experience. The only true fact that can be alleged against it is, 

 that it secretes from an organ, situate in its body, a kind of acrid liquid. 

 As to the Indian sea-hare, the body of which was covered with hair, Cuvier 

 professes himself quite at a loss to know what it might be ; but he thinks 

 that this name must have been given to some tetrodon, which may have 

 received the name from the cleft in the jaw and the skin, bristling with fine 

 and minute spines. The sailors, he says, attribute to the tetrodon certain 

 venomous properties. 



68 Cuvier says, that there is reason to believe that this is the same as 

 the vive of the French (probably our weever), the Trachinus draco of 

 Linnaeus. This creature, with the spiny projections of its first dorsal fin, 

 is able to inflict wounds that are extremely difficult to cure ; not because 

 they are venomous in any degree, but because the extremities being very 

 minute, sharp, and pointed, penetrate deep into the flesh. See c. 43 of 

 this Book. 



70 Or sting-ray, mentioned in c. 40 and c. 67 of this Book ; so called 

 from the Greek rpvyuv. Cuvier says, that this sting, or spine, is sharp, 

 like a saw ; and that when it has penetrated the flesh, it cannot be got out 

 without enlarging the wound. This it is, and not its fancied poisonous 

 qualities, that renders its wound so dangerous ; and as for its action upon 

 trees and iron, they are entirely fabulous. 



71 No<ni}juara \oifiwdrj, as Aristotle, Hist. Anim. B. viii. c. 25, calls 

 them. 



