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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC -MAGAZINE 



ribbon-fish. What would otherwise be only 

 a plain band is ornamented with most 

 delicate fin-tufts on head, tail, and body. 

 Dr Gunther remarked that "some writers 

 have supposed from the great length and 

 narrow shape of these fishes that they 

 have been mistaken for 'sea serpents,' but 

 as these monsters of the sea are always 

 represented by those who have had the 

 good fortune of meeting with them as 

 remarkably active, it is not likely that 

 harmless ribbon-fishes, which are either 

 dying or dead, have been the objects 

 described as 'sea serpents.' " On the 

 other hand, Goode and Bean, in their 

 Oceanic Ichthyology, say that "it seems 

 quite safe to assign to this group all the 

 so-called 'sea serpents' which have been 

 described as swimming- rapidly near the 

 surface with a horse-like head raised 

 above the water, surmounted by a mane- 

 like crest of red or brown." 



One of the most interesting of the 

 ribbon-fishes is the oar-fish (Rcgalecus 

 glesne), of which a number of examples 

 have been found on the coast of Europe 

 but only a few on the shores of North 

 America. The common name refers to 

 the blade-like expansion at the end of 

 each ventral fin. Specimens have been 

 known to reach a length of 20 feet, and 

 much larger ones undoubtedly exist. 

 One that went ashore in Bermuda in 

 i860 was 17 feet long after capture, but 

 was thought to be much larger by the 

 people who saw it in the water, and was 

 described as having "a head of an im- 

 mense horse with a flaming red mane." 

 This species was not recorded from 

 America until February, 1905, when a 

 mutilated fish was found at Anclote 

 Keys, on the west coast of Florida. 



It is a matter of considerable interest 

 that a second specimen should have been 

 taken in February, 1909, at Captiva, Lee 

 County, Florida. It was not quite dead 

 when picked up, and exhibited the beau- 



tiful coloring for which these fishes are 

 noted. The body was bright silvery,, 

 rivaling the tarpons, while a continuous 

 fin of blood-red hue extended from head 

 to tail, and on the head were a number 

 of scarlet hair-like streamers. Accord- 

 ing to Mr F. E. Brockway, of Beach 

 Haven, Pa., who found the fish and has 

 communicated this information to the 

 National Geographic Magazine, this. 

 example was 10 feet 8 inches long and 

 3^2 inches thick. 



Our knowledge of these fishes is due 

 to no activity on the part of zoologists 

 in finding their habitat and collecting 

 them therein, but to the circumstance that 

 when they die or lose their equilibrium 

 they fall upward and float on the surface, 

 whence they are picked up or drift 

 ashore. Nearly all the specimens known 

 have been found dead or dying, and few, 

 if any, have been secured in deep-sea 

 collecting apparatus. This suggests how 

 fragmentary must be our knowledge of 

 the larger animals of the oceanic abyss 

 and how possible it might be for unknown 

 monsters to exist there in abundance. 

 The appliances employed for securing 

 animals from the depths are adapted only 

 for the capture of comparatively small 

 creatures lying on or within a few feet 

 of the bottom and of so sluggish a dis- 

 position that they permit a net very 

 slowly scraped along the bottom to scoop 

 them up. If a net having a mouth ten 

 feet wide and two feet high were slowly 

 drawn for short distances and without 

 selection of locality along the surface of 

 the earth by a rope attached to an air- 

 ship floating one to two miles high, how 

 many bears, deer, lions, boa constrictors, 

 alligators, to say nothing of elephants, 

 giraffes, , and rhinoceroses, would likely 

 be caught and hauled up to the ship, even 

 if the net were drawn during the darkest 

 nights ? 



