258 THE HAUNTS OF LIFE 
(4) There has been much discussion over the 
FLYING FISHES, whether they show anything 
that can be called true flight, that is to say, 
whether their fore-fins strike the air or not. The 
general answer, for the common flying fish, 
Exocetus volitans, which one sees when one 
crosses the Atlantic, is that the creature takes 
a great leap out of the water, using its tail as 
propeller, and helped perhaps by the momen- 
tum of a wave; that it holds its pectoral fins 
taut, without more than slight vibrations, and 
uses them as vol-planes, not as wings; that it 
may for mechanical reasons rise in its vol- 
planing, so that it lands on the deck of a ship; 
and that the alteration of the curve of move- 
ment is in the main involuntary, being due to a 
slight tilting of the body. We have watched 
the common flying fishes with care and we 
never saw anything approaching a stroke with 
the fore-fins. We have seen them cross in front 
of the prow of the steamer and, in the course 
of their curve, come crashing against a port- 
hole. The leaping is often a desperate attempt 
to escape from their enemy the tunny. 
In regard to the Flying Gurnard (Dactyl- 
opterus) some good observers have described a 
fluttering of the pectoral fins, which looks like 
