Some Poetic Fish- Fancies. 143 



fishes who " pipe " and " snort " and *' grunt," and who make 

 noises that resemble drumming, whistling, and Jews'-harping. 



The masted nautilus, again, is a very pleasant exten- 

 sion of the ancient myth, and suggests all kinds of possi- 

 bilities a double-funnelled nautilus, a passenger nautilus 

 registered Ai at Lloyd's. Did any poet ever see one 

 jury-rigged? The gleaming porpoise that " shoots" (in 

 Moore) "along the wave," is a terror to mariners. Sea- 

 horses " prick up their ears," and sea-dogs hunt prey " by 

 scent." Seals, as we have seen, pursue children and pelt 

 them with stones. Sharks kill their victims in Darwin 

 "with descending blow," and in Shelley they have "red 

 gills." That trout hybernate in river mud is as much a 

 poetical fiction as Eliza Cook's whim that "pearls hang 

 thick on the red coral stems ; " or Congreve's vision of 

 flying-fish in a river. Lobsters, according to one poet, live 

 " in scarlet mail ; " and the prawn when alive is, according 

 to another, "pink-nosed." 



The nautilus suggests to Montgomery a pleasant figure 

 for the Esquimaux in their frail kayaks 



" Trained with inimitable skill to float, 

 Each balanced in his bubble of a boat." 



The shark, of course, provides an easy synonym for all 

 rogues of prey, and the gudgeon another for their victims : 



" The roving eye, the bosom bare, 

 The forward laugh, the wanton air, 

 May catch the fop, for gudgeons strike 

 At the bare hook and bait alike ; 

 While salmon play regardless by, 

 Till art like nature forms the fly." Moore. 



Says Cowper 



11 Like 

 Dart: 



"Live bullion" is Moore's pretty synonym for gold-fish; 



" Like trout pursued, the critic in despair, 

 Darts to the mud, and finds his safety there." 



