764 



SYNGNATHUS. 



which both are found, before and after the transfer 

 of the eggs, if any such difference there be, the man- 

 ner in which the eggs are transferred and fecundated, 

 and the time that they remain in the pouch before 

 the young are fully developed, are the most essential 

 parts which remain to be ascertained by future ob- 

 servations. 



Risso, in his valuable work on the fishes of the 

 Mediterranean a sea in which those fishes are more 

 abundant than they are upon our shores, mentions 

 that the adult pipe-fishes show an affection for their 

 young which is very rare among the finny tribes, 

 they being in general just as apt to eat the fry of 

 their own species as that of any other. But even 

 this point has not been ascertained with that precision 

 which is desirable in fishes of a character so very 

 peculiar. We can understand why the male should 

 be attached to the young of those fishes, and they to 

 him, but then we can see no more reason for a reci- 

 procal attachment between the female and the young, 

 than there is in the cases of fish that spawn in the 

 usual manner. The moment that the roe is trans- 

 ferred to the male all connexion between it and the 

 female appears to be at an end ; and it would be a 

 new and rather anomalous fact in physiology to find 

 a female attached to young for which she did and 

 could do nothing. This would be an affection without 

 an object ; and though we find that the human race 

 very frequently blunder into the exercise of such 

 affections, we are not aware of the existence of one 

 in the rest of nature. The affection of the male, or 

 rather of the young for the male, is well established, 

 and we can see its purpose. " I have been assured 

 by the fishermen," says Mr. Yarrell, " that if the young 

 were shaken out of the pouch into the water over 

 the side of the boat, they did not swim away, but, 

 when the parent fish was held in the water in a fa- 

 vourable position, the young would again enter the 

 pouch." The female has no such protection to give 

 them ; and thus it would be important to ascertain 

 whether the female has any attachment for the young 

 or is perfectly indifferent to them. 



The determining of this is a matter of no incon- 

 siderable importance in a physiological point of view. 

 The best portion of that labour which wholly de- 

 volves on the female in all other animals that bring 

 their young to maturity, either by internal gestation, 

 or by hatching, is, in the case of the pipe fishes, 

 transferred to the male ; and what we wish to know is, 

 " Is the maternal affection transferred along with 

 it?" This is a cross case the very reverse of what 

 usually occurs ; and, therefore, if we could getfcom- 

 plete information upon it, it would be an expenmen- 

 tum crucis, giving to our theories of the paternal and 

 filial affections of animals much of the force of demon- 

 stration. To those who do not reflect upon the length 

 to which a single well-established principle will often 

 carry us, this may seem only a trivial matter ; but it 

 would afford an easy and ready key to many apparent 

 anomalies that we meet with when we study the 

 actions of animals, and even those of mankind, for 

 the purpose of tracing them to their causes, the 

 most important purpose for which we can study 

 them. 



The motions of this fish in the water are somewhat 

 singular. Mr. Couch mentions, that " this species 

 may be seen slowly moving about in a singular man- 

 mer, horizontally or perpendicularly, with the head 

 upwards or downwards, and in every attitude of con- 



tortion in search of food, which seems to be chiefly 

 water insects." How the food finds it way to the 

 stomach is rather a puzzling matter, at least upon any 

 of the ordinary principles of deglutition. The gape 

 of the mouth can do little in this way, for it is very 

 small, the pipe of the produced jaws appearing as if 

 t could be half opened by a lid on the end, this lid 

 jeing the lower jaw, which does not come so low as 

 to be horizontal when the gape is distended, and the 

 upper jaw inclines backwards. The mouth is not 

 n any sense of the word a biting month, and it is 

 capable of enclosing only a very small substance, 

 without any apparent means of conveying it along 

 the pipe. Mr. Yarrell says, " These Syngnathi are 

 supposed to be able, by dilating their throat at plea- 

 sure, to draw their food up their cylindrical beak-like 

 mouth, as water is drawn up the pipe of a syringe." 

 This supposition is not satisfactory ; and that for this 

 obvious reason, that any one who looks at the tubular 

 part of the mouth of a pipe-fish, and who has at the 

 same time a knowledge of the principles of hy- 

 draulic action, would at once pronounce that this, if 

 fit for acting as a syringe at all, is about as clumsy 

 a one as could well be imagined. But Nature's ma- 

 chines are all the very best adapted to their purposes 

 that can be made that can be imagined, for nothing 

 at all approaching to them can be made ; rnd there- 

 fore there must be somej other use than this of the 

 singularly-formed mouths of those fishes, for which 

 the said mouths are much better adapted than any 

 other form of that organ which we can imagine. 

 What this may be is a matter of observation, and not 

 of any reasoning from analogy ; for the fishes are so 

 very peculiar that we cannot find an analogy that 

 will rightly apply to them. 



With the genus Pegasus, in which the mouth is 

 differently formed, these fishes are distinct from all 

 the rest as an order, and thus the elements of all our 

 knowledge of them must be drawn immediately from 

 observation of themselves. 



We have mentioned that, as they begin to produce 

 while yet very small, the size of these fishes cannot 

 be admitted into the general description of them ; but, 

 as the proportions are nearly the same for all sizes, 

 we shall thus quote Mr. Yarrell's very clear and 

 accurate statement of these as being perfectly de- 

 scriptive of the specie?. " From the point of the 

 tubular mouth to the posterior^edge of the indurated 

 portion of the operculum, the length is, when com- 

 pared with the whole length of the fish, as one to 

 eight ; if measured to the edge of the shoulder it is 

 as one to seven and a half, and this proportion exists 

 in individuals of various ages and lengths, from six 

 inches to eighteen ; from the mouth to a projecting 

 point at the anterior edge of the eye, and thence to 

 the pectoral fin, the distances are equal ; the jaws 

 united, tubular, slightly compressed ; in depth but 

 one-third that of the head at its deepest part, which 

 is in a vertical line with the centre of the operculum ; 

 the mouth small, placed at the extremity of the tube, 

 opening obliquely upwards ; the lower jaw the longest ; 

 eyes rather large, bony orbits prominent ; operculum 

 covered with radiating striae ; the head between the 

 eyes flattened ; behind the eyes rising into a keel-like 

 crest, which reaches to the neck ; from tfie pec- 

 toral fin to the anal aperture the body is deepest 

 and heptangular, with three ridges along each 

 side, and one along the abdomen, which ends at the 

 vent ; throughout the short length of the dorsal fin 



