64 GAR-FISH; FLYING-FISH. 



bers to both the Mackerels and Pikes. The body is usually 

 much elongated, the skin is covered with small scales, the ven- 

 tral fins are placed on the abdomen, and the dorsal and anal fins 

 are removed very far back towards the caudal. The Gar-fish, 

 or Sea- Pike, has a very elongated mouth, which is well furnished 

 with teeth. It is quick and active in the water ; swimming 

 with considerable rapidity near the surface, and leaping and 

 gambolling as if in the exuberance of vivacity. This Fish comes 

 in shoals to the southern coast of Britain, in the months of April 

 and May ; and from its appearing a short time before the Mac- 

 kerel, it is termed by the fishermen the Mackerel-guide. It is 

 not in much esteem as an article of food. To this group also 

 belongs the JExoccetus, best known as the Flying-fish ; which is 

 remarkable for the enormous development of its pectoral fins, 

 and for its power of sustaining itself upon them out of water. It 

 is necessary to bear in mind that the term Flying-fish has been 

 applied to this genus, in common with the Flying Gurnard 

 ( 608) ; and that, although really so different, they have been 

 continually confounded together in the accounts of voyagers. 

 The term Flying-fish ought to be restricted to the Exocoetus ; 

 which is the one that best deserves it. Various species exist in 

 different parts of the seas of warm latitudes ; and our own coast 

 has been occasionally visited by them. As elsewhere stated 

 (ANIM. PHYSIOL. 667), their flight through the air seems en- 

 tirely to depend upon the impulse they receive from the stroke 

 of their fins upon the water, at the moment of quitting it. They 

 are to a certain degree supported by their wing-like fins, while 

 sailing through the air ; but they do not seem able to raise or to 

 propel themselves by striking them against it. The most usual 

 height of their flight is from two to three feet ; but they have 

 occasionally been known to spring to a height of fifteen or even 

 twenty feet. The utmost length of their flight seems to be be- 

 tween two and three hundred feet; and its extreme duration 

 about thirty seconds. Few spectacles are more beautiful than 

 the sudden rise of a shoal of Flying-fish from the gently-undu- 

 lating surface of the tropical ocean, their scaly surface and ex- 

 tended fins glistening in the bright sunshine with all the varied 



