The Living Chimera and its Egg. 187 



certainly these organs stand in great contrast with the dull un- 

 intelligent eyes of the shark or the sturgeon. 



On account of its peculiar projecting teeth, four protruding 

 from the upper jaw and two from the lower jaw, the fish bears 

 in British Columbia the name of Rat-fish or Rabbit fish, and the 

 terms are appropriate as the mouth recalls most strikingly that 

 of a rodent. They are white or semi-transparent, and unlike the 

 teeth of sharks and rays are never replaced if lost. No doubt 

 moUusks and crustaceans from a large part of its food. 



The gill arrangements are most remarkable, for instead of 

 the five to eight exposed gill-openings in front of each breast 

 fin, such as we find in sharks, the Chimaera has a large operculum 

 or gill cover consisting of several broad plates marked by distinct 

 lines of division, and most effectively shielding the four-paired 

 gills within. The gill chamber opens by a narrow slit near the 

 base of the peduncle or stalk of the pectoral fin, on each side of 

 the head. No doubt the lines marking the separate opercular 

 plates are the tracks of mucus canals. Similar large smooth 

 plates encase the whole head. They resemble a coat of mail 

 resplendent with a brilliant metallic appearance. The head is 

 especially striking from its bright silvery lustre, over which, in 

 life, all the colours of the spectrum spread, golden yellow, rosy 

 pink, emerald green, pearly blue, indeed every prismatic tint. If 

 Chimaera is one of the sea's most grotesque creatures, it is, in its 

 rainbow glory, one of its most resplendent. The shrunken, 

 faded brownish or yellow examples of Chimraea, exhibited in 

 our museums, convey no idea of the real splendour of this strange 

 marine vertebrate. The crude semblance as if made of wrinkled 

 leather, is utterly unlike the smooth glittering, living fish. In 

 allusion to its beautiful colours the Norsemen call it the gold 

 or silver fish ; but its external appearance is not less remarkable, 

 to the naturalist, than its anatomical structure. 



In my dissection of a number of specimens in 1895 I noted 

 some of its structural features. Thus the short and capacious 

 intestine exhibited the spiral partition, or valve, which we also 

 find in sharks and ganoids. 



