576 MALACOPTERYGII. 



thrown into a pail of water, adhered so firmly to the bottom that 

 the pail was lifted by taking hold of the tail of the fish. 



(25) EcheneidcB, (Gr. echo, to hold ; neus, a ship.) 



This family is represented by the genus Echeneis, the name 

 referring to the flattened disk of cartilaginous plates, covering the 

 top of the head, and enabling the fish to attach itself to other 

 bodies. 



The COMMON SUCKER, E. remora, (Lai. delay,) is found 

 throughout the Atlantic Ocean. It has sometimes been taken 

 from the bottom of vessels in the harbor of New York. One 

 species, the WHITE-TAILED REMORA, E. alUcauda> (Lat. white- 

 tail,) is called the SHARK-SUCKER, from being frequently found 

 attached to that fish. 



SUB-ORDER APODES, (Gr. footless.) 



These are without ventral fins. 



(26) Anguillidcp, (Lat. an eel,) or Muraenida, (Gr. muraina, 

 a kind of fish.) 



This is the Eel family, which have long, snake-like bodies 

 and small scales so imbedded in the soft, slimy skin, as to be 

 scarcely perceptible. The dorsal, anal, and caudal fins are 

 united, and the rays so delicate as to be with difficulty enumer- 

 ated. They have been estimated to be as many as three hund- 

 red and twenty, or three hundred and forty. During the season 

 of its activity the eel is a voracious feeder. Conger or Sea Eels, 

 Anguilla conger, (Lat. sea-eel,) or Conger occidentalis, (Lat. 

 western,) are larger than the Common Eels. Yarrell, in his 

 British Fishes, says that " specimens of Conger Eels weighing 

 eighty-six pounds, one hundred and four pounds, and even one 

 hundred and thirty pounds, have been recorded, some of them 

 measuring more than ten feet long and eighteen inches in cir- 

 cumference." (See fig. on Chart.) 



" The ancient Romans reared these fish with great care, in 

 consecrated ponds, and they even decorated them with jewels. 

 Six thousand were served up at one entertainment given to Cae- 

 sar when he entered upon his dictatorship." The branchial 

 pouches of Eels enable them to crawl and remain some time out 

 of water, and thus they can move from one place to another in 

 search of food, being hardly inferior to any other fish in the 

 power of enduring abstinence from their native element. They 

 are strongly susceptible of magnetic or galvanic influence. Their 

 eggs are so diminutive as to escape observation, which may have 

 given rise to the notion that these fish are viviparous. 



