OCCASIONAL NOTES. 69 
propelled, the former greatly outweighing the latter. Why, may I ask, 
should the fish have been endowed with such power? Not to escape foes 
in the water or out of it, as it would be less likely to fall a prey to either 
bird or fish by flying with the wind. He speaks of its “ dipping the caudal 
lobe in the water” to aid it in its flight; but I do not think that would 
enable the fish to rise again. Dr. Kneeland says “the tail acts like a 
spring,” and so it may when the fish is in the water. Dr. Pettigrew remarks 
that “their flight or leap is indicated by the are of a circle.’ Mr. Whitman, 
on the contrary, says, “the flight, executed in a horizontal plane, is seldom 
raised above the surface of the water by more than two or three feet.” With 
more experience he might have seen them at ten times that height above 
the water; in proof of which they not unfrequently drop on the decks of 
large vessels. Though mostly injured by contact with spars or rigging, 
some, I think, might be secured alive if immersed at once in tub or bucket, 
affording better specimens for examination than the alcohol-soaked fish 
experimented on by Prof. Mobius. As to distance of flight, I think it 
greatly underrated by Mr. Whitman, who speaks of eight hundred feet as 
a “remarkable long flight,” but I believe the fish overs double that distance 
when driven by a gale, and then I think it must close the pectoral fins to 
enable it to alight. He speaks of the observer's eye being sharpened by 
experience, but that can hardly be acquired in a few days, it being difficult 
to judge distances at sea, particularly when rough. In referring to obser- 
vations made when the sea was perfectly smooth, Mr. Whitman says that 
the fish rise from the water by ‘‘a flapping of the pectorals, while the 
ventrals were held in quiet expansion ”; whereas Dr. Pettigrew speaks of “the 
velocity acquired by the vigorous lashing of the tail in the water to the air.” 
I have been in ships becalmed for weeks in the tropics, and believe, as 
Dr. Pettigrew says, that there must be a lashing of the tail in the water to aid 
the fish in rising—not that I think it could be propelled many feet by it or 
fly far unaided by the wind; but that they are endowed with some power of 
flight, even when calm, is self-evident, or they would falt-an easy prey to 
Albicore, Bonetta, and other fish Hyry Haprisxip (High Cliff, Ventnor, 
Isle of Wight). 
Rep Mutuer orF THE Cornish Coast In DecemBer.—I have had 
reported to me the capture, on December 9th, of a large Red Mullet, Mullus 
surmuletus, off the Gear Rock, in Mount’s Bay, about one mile from the 
shore and in four fathoms water on a rocky bottom. I did not myself see 
the fish, but I have no doubt that my informant is correct as to the species. 
The late occurrence of this fish in our bay shows that it is present all the 
year round. I have now taken or received this fish in April, and thence in 
every month to December, and in that month twice.—THomas Cornisu 
(Penzance). 
