240 CONFESSIONS OF A BEACHCOMBER 



In the days of hoary antiquity it was believed that this 

 strange fish was wont to affix itself to the bottom of a 

 ship, and was able of its malice to hold it stationary in a 

 stiff breeze though all sails were set. According to the 

 legend (a popular method by means of which the descen- 

 dants of great men explained away their faults and 

 blunders), at the famous sea-fight at Actium, Mark Antony's 

 ship was held back by a remora in spite of the efforts of 

 hundreds of willing galley-slaves. Shakespeare may say 

 that Cleopatra's " fearful sails " were the cause of Antony's 

 fatal indecision and flight, and a lesser poet may cast the 

 blame upon her " timid tear " ; but the tribute to the 

 remora's interference with the fate of nations was accepted 

 in good faith at the time, and was, moreover, supported and 

 confirmed by the inglorious experience of other great men 

 who hung back when they should have sailed boldly on to 

 victory or noble disaster. 



Vulgarly known nowadays as "the sucker," and to 

 science as the ''Echeneis remora" and " Echeneis naucrates" 

 and to the blacks as " Cum-mai," the fish upon which such 

 grave responsibility was thrown by the ancients monopolises 

 the sub-order o{ Acanthoptaygii {discocephali). Its distin- 

 guishing feature is a shield or disc extending from the tip 

 of the upper jaw to a point behind the shoulders, and said to 

 be a modification of the spurious dorsal fin. This structure 

 consists of a mid-rib and a number of transverse flat ridges 

 capable of being raised or depressed. The disc has a 

 membranous continuous edge or margin. When the fish 

 presses the soft edge of the disc against any smooth 

 surface and depresses the ridges and the intervening spaces, 

 a vacuum is formed, giving it enormous holding power. 

 Other countries have sucker fish of different form ; but it 

 remained for the benighted Australian blacks, among a 

 few other savage races, to make practical use of the creature, 

 which, as a means of locomotion, forms strong attach- 

 ments to the dugong, turtle, shark and porpoise. It 

 can hardly be called domesticated, yet it is employed 

 after the manner of the falcon in hawking, save that 



