FISHES. 233 



elongated upper jaw (Fig. 189) forms the sword, which is fre- 

 quently found three or four feet in length. The fish occasionally 

 attains a length of more than twelve feet, and a weight of more 

 than four hundred pounds. It is said to entertain great hostility 

 to the whale; and some of them will join in stahbing it below, 

 while the Fox-sharks will fling themselves several yards into 

 the air, and descend upon the back of their unhappy victim. 

 It is a commonly received notion, that it is in consequence of 

 mistaking the hull of a ship at sea for a whale that the Sword- 

 fish occasionally thrusts his sword-like beak into the vessel.* 



Fig. 189. SWORD-FISH. 



The force with which this is done must be very considerable; 

 many museums contain planks thus pierced either by the 

 Sword-fish or others nearly allied to it. A portion of its 

 sword, about nine inches in length and two inches diameter, 

 was sent to the Belfast Museum, f taken from the Euphemia, 

 a vessel which had become leaky on her passage to Brazil. 

 It had been driven not only through the copper sheathing, 

 but also through nine inches of the solid timbers. Other 

 instances are recorded of vessels having suddenly sprung a 

 leak, and being with difficulty got into port, the Sword-fish 

 having been the origin of the calamity. 



Fig. 190. ELECTRIC SILURUS. 



But a still more remarkable mode of defence is exercised by 

 some species of fish, in the power they possess of giving a 

 severe electric shock. One of these is the electric Silurus or 

 Malepterurus of the Nile (Fig. 190), a fish to which the 



* Yarrell, p. 145. 



f Thompson, in Annals of Natural History, vol. xiii. p. 235. 



