THE VALUE OF A TEAK. 



25 



others bottom fish, like the flounders and the flat-fish family ; 

 some prefer a sandy bottom, as the kingfish, others a rocky, 

 as the striped bass ; and yet others rejoice in mud, as the eels 

 and catfish, with the rest of the silurus family. Some fish 

 prefer salt water, others fresh, and yet others brackish ; .while 

 eels prefer to spawn in salt water and fatten in fresh, as pal- 

 pably as do salmon -pursue the opposite by feeding in salt 

 water and spawning in fresh. Thus salmon, shad, and striped 

 bass prefer to feed in salt water, spawn in fresh, and dally in 

 brackish waters. Some fishes keep near shore, others in deep 

 water and far from land. Bottom fishes are usually sluggish, 

 w r hile surface swimmers are generally active. Some lose 

 their vitality as soon as they are landed, others live a long 

 time out of water, and dart revengeful glances at their cap- 

 tors. Some can creep like the eel, others climb trees like the 

 anabas scandens. 



I may also state my conviction that a whale is a fish, and 

 that the porpoise is also a fish, though members of this genus 

 travel in pairs, suckle their young, of which they usually have 

 but one at a birth, which the parent mammals guard with 

 jealous care, making it swim between them; and if the calf 

 is harpooned, the mother always yields her life an easy prey 

 to the same weapon. The dudong, one of the, most intelli- 

 gent of mammal fishes, is the Malays' emblem of constancy 

 in affection ; and as it is said to cry when wounded by the 

 harpoon and brought on deck, they catch the tears and bottle 

 them as a charm, supposing that the application of a single 

 drop will render a wife constant for life. 



The black porpoise- and the puffing porpus are great con- 

 sumers of estuary fishes. They should not only be hunted 

 and harpooned, but small cannon loaded with grape or canis- 

 ter should be so planted as to project their contents into the 

 shoals which attempt to forage near bassing grounds. Por- 

 poises watch mouths of rivers for salmon, and they are sup- 

 posed to be the principal cause of depopulating many of the 

 Irish rivers of that royal fish. 



