ELECTRICAL FISHES. 



255 



a high degree of civilisation, should have been bestowed, most 

 likely long before man appeared upon the stage of life, upon a 

 few members of the finny race, and to these alone of all created 

 beings. 



The electrical organs vary considerably in situation and form 

 in the different fishes to which they have been given. Thus in 

 the electric eel (Gymnotus electricus), which inhabits the large 

 rivers of South America, they run along the tail, while in the tor- 

 pedo of the Mediterranean 

 they are situated on each side 

 of the anterior part of the 

 body. In this formidable 

 ray they consist of a mul- 

 titude of small prismatic 

 columns (E), invested with 

 strong fascial coverings. 

 These prisms lie close toge- 

 ther, parallel with one ano- 

 ther, and perpendicularly 

 between the dorsal and ven- 

 tral surfaces of the fish, so 

 that their extremities are 

 separated from these sur- 

 faces only by their fascial 

 and common integuments. 

 When these are removed 



the Columns present Some- Muscles an <3- Electric Batteries of the Torpedo. 

 r (Owen's Lectures.) 



thing of the appearance of 



a honeycomb. Each column is again divided into numerous 

 distinct compartments, by delicate membranous partitions 

 placed horizontally at very short distances from each other 

 (150 to an inch), and covered with a fine network of arteries, 

 veins, and nerves. The interstices between them are filled with 

 a gelatinous mass. 



In the electric eel a similar subdivision takes place by means 

 of longitudinal plates and transverse membranes, which how- 

 ever are placed much more closely together than in the torpedo, 

 as 240 of them have been counted in an inch. By this structure 

 an immense discharging surface is obtained ; for in a torpedo of 

 ordinary size, where the electrical organ is seven or eight inches 



