SOME STRANGE FISH 



the spine of his back or breast-fin, and either snapping it 

 or doing his best to capsize the boat. So powerful are the 

 fins, in fact, that he will seize the blade of a paddle with 

 one of them and jerk it out of an unwary hand in an instant. 



Another member of his tribe (siluridae), the largest 

 fresh-water fish in Europe, is found in the Elbe and 

 Danube, under various local names, measuring eight feet 

 long and weighing about three hundredweight. 



Further varieties of the same family are also found 

 in other South American rivers, the best known of which 

 is called by zoologists the callicMhys ; it is covered from 

 end to end with rows of small scaly plates, and on the 

 head is a kind of bony helmet. Not only does it make a 

 regular nest in the mud, wherein it deposits its eggs, but, 

 if the stream or pool in which it lives dries up in the hot 

 weather, it will make a considerable land journey to some 

 other piece of water ; and it is on these journeys that it is 

 generally lain in wait for and speared by the Indians. 

 One more member of this genus, common in the Essequibo, 

 the most highly prized of all as a table delicacy, is the 

 " broad-mouth " (platystoma), the most beautifully marked 

 of any ; the skin is a pale blue, and across the back are 

 alternate stripes of black and white; from their flat 

 snouts and wide jaws, which they are in the habit of 

 poking above the surface, they may easily be mistaken at 

 first sight for alligators. 



Alligators, by the way, are not the only foes to river 

 fishers here. In the streams of Paraguay are enormous 

 water-serpents which have been known to upset a light 

 canoe and drag one of the occupants under water. 



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