24 THREE CRUISES OF THE " BLAKE." 



quite a strong shock to Commander Bartlett and me. The 

 goose-fish and the hag go down at least over 350, the " Norway 

 haddock " to more than 150 fathoms. The swordfish, when 

 attacked at the surface, is able to " sound " with ease and ra- 

 pidity to a depth of 500 or 1,000 feet, arriving at the bottom 

 with such force as to imbed its sword at full length in the mud, 

 and there seems to be nothing to prevent powerful swimmers 

 from visiting the bottom at any time when the conditions of tem- 

 perature will permit. Scopelus, one of the most common pelagic 

 fishes, may live at considerable depths : it comes up to the sur- 

 face mainly during calm nights. 



The number of representatives of shallow - water families 

 dredged below 100 fathoms and down to a depth of 500 fath- 

 oms is quite large, but diminishes rapidly below that depth, two 

 or three extending only to 700 fathoms, and an equal number 

 to 1,000 and 2,000 fathoms. 



To the bottom-living species which may have made their way 

 gradually down to deep water upon the continental slopes be- 

 long preeminently the flat fishes. Fourteen species have been 

 detected on our Atlantic coast, living beyond the hundred-fathom 



Fig. 197. Monolene atrimana. 



line. One of them (Monolene) (Fig. 197) comes from 300 fath- 

 oms, and three genera occur well down toward the thousand- 

 fathom line. The pole flounder ranges beyond this limit, and 

 breeds in deep water. It has the cavernous skeleton of the deep- 

 sea fishes. In Bedford Basin, Nova Scotia, and in adjacent 

 waters, it lives at depths of about 15 to 20 fathoms, and yet indi- 

 viduals captured there exhibit the peculiarities of abyssal types. 



