568 THE OCEAN WORLD. 



he loot not the tenth part of a second in shaping his course so as to 

 cut off the chase ; while they, in a manner really not unlike that of 

 the hare, doubled more than once upon their pursuer. But it was soon 

 plainly to be seen that the strength and confidence of the flying-fish 

 were first ebbing ; their flights became shorter and shorter, and their 

 course more fluttering and uncertain, while the leaps of the dolphin 

 seemed to grow more vigorous at each bound. Eventually this 

 skilful sea-sportsman seemed to arrange his springs so as to fall just 



Fig. 373 — Stomia« boa. 



under the very spot on which the exhausted flying-fish were about to 

 drop. This catastrophe took place at too great a distance for us to 

 see from the deck what happened ; but on our mounting high on the 

 rigging, we may be said to have been in at the death ; for then we 

 could discover that the unfortunate little creatures, one after another, 

 either popped right into the dolphin's jaws as they lighted on the 

 water, or were snapped up instantly after." 



E.sociD^. — This family contains the well-known fresh-water Pike 

 and also the marine genus Bc/onc, to which the gar fish belongs, 

 and the strange genus Stomias. Here the body is much elongated, 

 the muzzle being very short, the moutli very deeply cleft, the opercula 

 reduced to small membranous lamina ; the intermaxillary palatine 



I 



