296 GAR FISHES, OR GANOIDS 



S. Webster tells the story of a death pool near the Rio Grande. 

 While collecting birds near Brownsville, Texas, he discovered 

 a large pool which had been filled by the overflow of the river, 

 but afterward entirely cut off by the receding of the flood 

 waters. A muddy pool 75 feet long by 25 feet wide was 

 crowded full of Alligator Gars, living, dying and dead, vary- 

 ing in size from 2 feet to 6. Mr. Webster estimated that 

 that tiny area of water and mud, no larger than a fair-sized 

 ballroom, contained between 700 and 800 fishes, all doomed 

 to speedy annihilation by the evaporation of the remaining 

 water. When he discharged his shotgun into the mass, pan- 

 demonium ensued. The pool became a seething mass of 

 frantic life, and the wild rushing to and fro of the large fishes 

 actually threw smaller ones into the air. 



A million years from now the few men of science who 

 have not yet perished from cold may discover on the summit 

 of a lofty, rock-ribbed mesa at the edge of a great desert, a 

 marvellous deposit of fossil Alligator Gars, and wonder how 

 so many fishes chose to die in the same spot. But only the 

 rocks will then be able to tell the story of Mr. Webster's 

 pool, and the world will be too cold to care for it. 



