Tue VaLve or A TEAR. 25 
others bottom fish, like the flounders and the flat-fish family ; 
some prefer a sandy bottom, as the kingfish, others a rocky, 
as the striped bass; and yet others rejoice in mud, as the eels 
and catfish, with the rest of the silurus family. Some fish 
preter salt water, others fresh, and yet others brackish; while 
eels prefer to spawn in salt water and fatten in fresh, as pal- 
pably as do salmon pursue the opposite by feeding in salt 
water and spawning in fresh. Thus salmon, shad, and striped 
bass prefer to feed in salt water, spawn in fresh, and dally in 
brackish waters. Some fishes keep near shore, others in deep 
water and far from land. Bottom fishes are usually sluggish, 
while surface swimmers are generally active. Some lose 
their vitality as soon as they are landed, others live a long 
time out of water, and dart revengeful glances at their cap- 
tors. Some can creep like the ecl, others climb trees like the 
anabas scandens. 
I may also state my conviction that a whale is a fish, and 
that the porpoise is also a fish, though members of this genus 
travel in pairs, suckle their young, of which they usually have 
but one at a birth, which the parent mammals guard with 
jealous care, making it swim between them; and if the calf 
is harpooned, the mother always yields her life an easy prey 
to the same weapon. The dudong, one of the most intelli- 
gent of mammal fishes, is the Malays’ emblem of constancy 
in affection; and as it is said to cry when wounded by the 
harpoon and brought on, deck, they catch the tears and bottle 
them as a charm, supposing that the application of a single 
drop will render a wife constant for life. 
The black porpoise and the puffing porpus are great con- 
sumers of estuary fishes. They should not only be hunted 
and harpooned, but small cannon loaded with grape or canis- 
ter should be so planted as to project their contents into the 
shoals which attempt to forage near bassing grounds. Por- 
poises watch mouths of rivers for salmon, and they are sup- 
posed to be the principal cause of depopulating many of the 
Irish rivers of that royal fish. 
