SYNGNATHUS. 



763 



its upper edge. There seems thus to be in their 

 breathing apparatus something between the character 

 of the tree gills of bony fishes, and the fixed gills of 

 the chondropterygii. Even in the covering of their 

 bodies, there is this intermediate sort of character. 

 Most of the chondropterygii have the body covered 

 with bony plate?, or granulated with very hard tu- 

 bercles ; and the pipe fishes have their long and ' 

 slender bodies defended by a great number of hard ! 

 plates, which arc variously figured or sculptured upon ' 

 the surface. All the species, whether of this section 

 or the other, and indeed all the Lophobranchii, or 

 fishes with tufted gills, are inhabitants of the salt 

 water only ; and, though many of them have great 

 swimming powers, they are seldom found at any very 

 great distance from the land. In general, whether 

 nearer the land or farther iu the offing, they are found 

 near sea-sand bottoms ; and hence we may perhaps 

 conclude that they feed upon the small Crustacea and 

 mollusca that have their residence in or near such 

 sand, and on the very young fry of such fishes as de- 

 posit their eggs in the sand as a place of safety. 



Some of the species, those of the present section 

 especially, appear to follow the habit of many fishes, 

 in approaching nearer the shores at some seasons and 

 receding farther from them at others. When fishes 

 do this it is usually connected with their spawning, 

 the seaward course is taken in order to recruit the 

 strength and improve the growth of the individual 

 fish; und the shallow water where they can have the 

 influence of the direct light and heat of the sun, and 

 also the radiation and reflection from the bottom, is 

 undertaken in order to mature the spawn ; while those 

 which deposit their spawn, and they are by far the 

 most numerous of fishes, find near the shore the proper 

 places for it. In the depths of the sea there is of 

 course little stimulus to anything at the bottom ; and 

 thus, if the spawn of fishes were placed there, it 

 might lie inert for years or for ages. The SyngomtM 

 carry their spawn about with them till it is hatched, 

 and thus they can always have it in that temperature 

 which is the very best for bringing it to maturity. On 

 the British shores some, at least, of the pipe-fishes 

 are said to go twice in the year to the deep water, 

 but whether they spawn twice in the year has not 

 been fully ascertained. 



The Great Pipefish (. acus}, is perhaps the most 

 frequently found on the British coasts, sometimes 

 among the sea-weed just by the low-water line, and 

 at other times in the water at considerable depths. 

 They arc seldom more than a foot and a half in 

 length, and they corne so far to maturity as to be 

 capable of breeding when they are less than half a 

 foot in length. These circumstances render it rather 

 a difficult matter to say what is the proper size of 

 them ; and, indeed, the power of growth in most 

 fishes is so indefinite, that any positive statement of 

 their size is calculated only to mislead. All that can 

 be said with certainty about this one is, that, though 

 it is called the great pipe-fish, it is always a small 

 fish as compared with the greater number of the 

 other fishes. The male and female are very readily 

 distinguished from each other by the presence of the 

 abdominal valves or pouch on the former and its 

 absence in the latter ; there is generally also roe in 

 the female, in some state of forwardness, the more so 

 the nearer the shore we believe, and the male some- 

 times has roe in the abdominal pouch and sometimes 

 not. It does not appear that the whole which are 



deposited in that receptacle are brought forward at 

 the same time ; for, when the fishes have been exa- 

 mined, it has been found that the young in some of 

 the ova were only beginning to be formed, while in 

 others they were complete, and that some of the 

 empty pellicles of the ova remained adhering to the 

 valves of the pouch. When and how the eggs are 

 transferred to the pouch of the male, and whether 

 gradually or the whole production of the female at 

 once, we are not informed, neither are we acquainted 

 with the economy of the two after the transfer. If 

 we were to reason from the analogy of other fishes, 

 which however is not a conclusive mode of reasoning, 

 notwithstanding that the milt and roe are primarily 

 formed in the pipe fishes, just in the same manner as 

 in the others, if we were to reason thus, we should 

 be inclined to say that the males must remain near 

 the shores in order to hatch the eggs in the pouch, 

 for some time after the females have retired to the 

 deep water, for the purpose of recruiting their strength 

 and preparing a new succession of eggs ; this is what 

 the general law of nature would lead us to conclude, 

 and it is to be wished that the habits of the fish had 

 been observed with reference to this law. As the 

 eggs are transferred from the one to the other, we 

 might expect that the two sexes should alternate with 

 each other in their stay upon the coast, that they 

 should do this in the single pair and in the average 

 of the whole for the season, although during that 

 season we may expect both to be coming and going 

 for a very considerable period of time. It is perhaps 

 this which occasions the double resort to the deep 

 water which is mentioned by the authorities, and 

 which probably consists chiefly of the females at the 

 one time, and of the males at the other. It is only 

 of late, however, that the attention of physiological 

 naturalists has been drawn to the subject, and there- 

 fore many observations have yet to be made before 

 the details of their singular economy are clearly 

 established. The statement of the leading facts in 

 " Yarrell's British Fishes," cannot fail in being highly 

 useful as lights to guide them who are upon the 

 ground, and have the inclination as well as the oppor- 

 tunity for clearing up this and many other points in 

 the economy of the characteristic natives of that sea 

 which is so especially interesting to every Briton. 

 The following account of the late Mr. Walcott's 

 observations, as quoted by Mr. Yarrell, is very satis- 

 factory as far as it goes, and it may also enable us 

 to state the principal points upon which farther 

 information is necessary, in order to complete the 

 history of the fish in a satisfactory manner. " The 

 male differs from the female in the belly from the 

 vent to the tail fin being much broader, and in having 

 for about two-thirds of its length two soft flaps, \\ Inch 

 fold together, and form a false belly or pouch. They 

 breed in the summer ; the females casting their roe 

 into the false belly of the male. This I have asserted 

 from having examined many, and having constantly 

 found, early in the summer, roe in those without a 

 false belly, but never in those with ; and on opening 

 them later in the summer, there has been no roe in 

 those which I have termed the female, but only iu 

 the false belly of the male." Following up the train 

 of these observations, Mr. Yarrell found, about the 

 hottest time of the year, eggs in a state of maturity, 

 eggs from which the young had escaped, and hollow 

 impressions from which the capsules or cases of the 

 eggs had parted. The different depths of water in 



