1835.] Notice of an Extraordinary Fish. 219 



though no had weather had occurred. This last account I afterwards 

 found singularly corroborated. 



3. That it was considered as dangerous hy the Spanish gun-boats ; 

 that they always when there kept a swivel loaded, the report of which, 

 they said, drove it away. My principal informant was a man em- 

 ployed as a pilot for the ports in the Phillippine Islands, whither I was 

 bound, who had passed his whole life in the gun-boats. He said that 

 one instance of its voracity occurred when he was present. A man, 

 who was pushed overboard in the hurry to look at the monster, being 

 instantly swallowed by it. 



4. The native fishermen of the Bay of Manilla quite corroborate this 

 account, and speak of the monster with great terror. 



About 1820 or 1821, an American ship's boat, with an officer and 

 few men, was proceeding from Manilla to Cavite ; but, meeting with a 

 severe squall and thick weather, they were driven nearly into 

 the middle of the bay. They were pulling in what they thought 

 the best direction, when on a sudden the sailors all dropped their oars ! 

 But the mate, who was steering, looking astern of the boat, saw the 

 open jaws of a huge fish almost over him ! Having nothing at hand, 

 he threw the boat's tiller into the mouth of the fish ! shouting as loud 

 as possible ; when, the jaws closing with a tremendous crash, the 

 whole fish, which they described to be more like a spotted whale / 

 than anything else, dived beneath the boat, and was seen no more. I 

 do not now recollect the names of the ship, or of the captain, but I 

 thought the circumstance of the spotted appearance a remarkable proof 

 that the story was not an invention. " We do not like to tell it," said 

 the American Captain, " for fear of being laughed at ; but my officer is 

 quite trust- worthy, and we have learnt from the fishermen too, that 

 there is some strange species of large fish highly dangerous to their 

 boats." 



Like the American officer, I fear almost being laughed at, were it 

 not that, could we collect more facts relative to these strange mon- 

 sters, they might perhaps at least explain some of the " coral spots," 

 so often mentioned in our charts* : independent of its being a matter 

 of great interest to the naturalist. I therefore add here a vague notice ' 

 of monstrous spotted fish, which are known in the Moluccas. 



These are called by the fishermen of Ternate, Celebes, &c. a " Ikan 

 Bintang," (or star-fish,) from the bright light which they occasion, and 

 by which they are recognised at great depths at night, in calm weather. 

 The Malay fishermen describe them too as spotted, as large as a whale, 



* Horsburgh alludes to shoals of Devil fish. Lophius being perhaps mistaken 

 for shoals. 



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