90 WILD NEIGHBORS CHAP. 
stingaree (which sometimes reaches a length of ten 
feet) bears upon its top, near the root, a long, sharp 
and barbed spine, with which it is able to inflict 
deep and danger- 
ous wounds, when 
aroused to self-de- 
fence. Some acrid 
or poisonous sub- 
stance seems to en- 
ter the lacerations 
thus made, and fish- 
ermen pierced in 
the feet or hands by this species, or by the 
tropical whip-ray, as often happens, find their 
wounds slow and painful in healing. : 
Something of the same kind, but even worse, is 
the stabbing apparatus of the surgeon-fish of 
Florida and the West Indies. “Each side of the 
tail,’ says Goode, “is provided with a sharp, 
lancet-like spine, which, when at rest, is received 
into 2 sheath, but it may be thrust out at right 
angles to the body, and used as a weapon of 
offence; sweeping the tail from side to side as 
they swim, they can inflict very serious wounds, 
and I have seen in the Bermudas large fishes, con- 
fined in the same aquarium-tank with them, cov- 
ered with gashes inflicted in this manner.” 
In the philosophy of animal coloring brought 
about by natural selection, which has been elabo- 
rated by Alfred Russell Wallace, Mr. Poulton, and 
ARMED TAIL OF THE STING-RAY. 
