OSSEOUS FISHES. 603 



upper jaw being elongated into a formidable spear or sword, was 

 known to the ancients, and has borne the name which recalls its 

 salient characteristic from very early times. In short, it is recog- 

 nized at a glance from its organic structure, and from the resemblance 

 of its prolonged horizontal and trenchant muzzle to the blade of a 

 sword. With the ancients it was H^tas, and Gladius ; with the 

 moderns it is the Sword-fish, the Dart, the Spece spada, and lEspadon 

 epee. 



This fish attains a great size, being found in the Mediterranean 

 and Atlantic, in company with the tunny, from five to six feet in 

 length. Its body is lengthy, and covered with minute scales, the 

 sword forming three-tenths of its length. On the back it bears a 

 single long dorsal fin ; the tail is keeled, the lower jaw is sharp, the 

 mouth toothless, the upper part of the fish bluish-black, merging into 

 silver beneath. It seems to have a natural desire to exercise towards 

 and against all the arm with which Nature has furnished it ; it darts 

 with the utmost fury upon the most formidable moving bodies ; it 

 attacks the whale; and there are numerous and well-authenti- 

 cated instances of ships being perforated by the weapon of this power- 

 ful creature. 



In 1725, some carpenters having occasion to examine the bottom of 

 a ship which had just returned from the tropical seas, found the lance 

 of a sword-fish buried deep in the timbers of the ship. They declared 

 that, to drive a pointed bolt of iron of the same size and form to the 

 same depth, would require eight or nine blows of a hammer weighing 

 thirty pounds. From the position of the weapon it was evident that 

 the fish had followed the ship while under full sail ; it had penetrated 

 through the metal sheathing, and three inches and a half beyond, into 

 the solid frame. 



The sword-fish has obstinate combats with the saw-fish, and even 

 the shark, and it is supposed that when he attacks the bottom of a 

 vessel he takes that sombre mass for the body of an enemy. But this 

 terrible jouster, this Paladin of the abyss, often becomes himself the 

 prey of a most contemptible enemy. A miserable little parasite, the 

 Pennatula filesa, penetrates its flesh, and almost drives it mad with pain. 



The flesh of the young sword-fish is white, compact, and of ex- 

 cellent taste ; that of adults resembles the tunny. It is the object of 

 a fishery of some importance in the Straits of Messina. The fisher- 



