604 



THE OCEAN WOELD. 



men of Messina and Reggio join in this fishery with a great number of 

 boats, carrying brilliant flambeaux, while one of the crew is stationed 

 at the mast-head to announce the approach of the sword-fish. At a 

 given signal the boats rush on to attack them with the harpoons 

 (Fig. 393). During this fishery the sailors sing a peculiar melody, 

 but without words. 



Fig. 393. Fishing for Sword-fi&h in the Straits of Messina. 



The family of Pediculate Pectorals is so named from the fishes of 

 which it is composed bearing their pectoral fins on a species of arm 

 which forms a prolongation of the carp bone ; it includes the Frog- 

 fish, remarkable for the excessive circumference of the head and 

 shoulders as compared with the rest of the body, the immense opening 

 of a jaw, armed with pointed teeth, and the cutaneous jagged stripes 

 of various lengths with which it bristles at many points. Its skin 

 is soft, smooth, and without scales or other asperities ; the members 

 which support the pectorals, and other peculiarities, combine to 

 render it a hideous and forbidding object, well calculated in ignorant 

 and superstitious times to frighten the multitude. The remains 

 of this fish, prepared in such a manner as to be transparent, 



