118 Fisuine 1 AmeEricAN WATERS. 
proximately rigid, being fixed and translucent; the rays, 
though not spinous, remain standing even after life is extinct. 
These fins are like sails always set, or like a centre-board 
above as well as in the keel. The body, head, and fins for 
half an inch are covered with infinitesimal scales, The jaws 
are very strong, and the gill-covers like three plates of steel. 
The jaws are armed with a row of strong, closely-sct, sharp 
teeth, which will cut a cord of one fourth of an inch in diam- 
eter in two as smoothly as it could be done with a knife, for 
they are sharp-edged, and those of each jaw are like saw- 
teeth which match perfectly ; therefore beware of fingers in 
dislodging a hook from its powerful jaws. 
The young bluefish, which are hatched in quiet nooks of 
bays along the beaches, wag their way like other estuary 
younglings, without being provided with a bag of provision 
suspended by the umbilical cord, like the young of the Salmo 
genus, but by instinct they propel their tiny selves to the sa- 
line creeks and inlets from the sea, to prevent being devoured 
by the parents which visit the spawning beds early in June, 
to subsist on such of their young as have not yet emigrated. 
The young fish are vulgarly called “snapper” or “ 
mackerel,” and are the bright little predacious thieves which 
steal by small particles the angler’s bait before striped bass 
snapping 
or squeteague can get a taste of it. In October, having 
grown to the weight of halfa pound each, the shoal reunites 
preparatory to going into winter quarters, where the Gulf 
Stream keeps the water at an even temperature; and if per- 
chance they meet gut snells on their way, they bite them in 
two without effort. During the last fortnight of their sojourn 
near the shore they purvey for young menhaden and spear- 
ing, but keep at a respectful distance from shoals of older 
fish. This is supposed to be the case with nearly all shoals 
of coast and estuary fishes, and a shoal is merely the progeny 
of one pair of fishes, and the hatch of one laying of ova. 
Though in summer they may wander apart for food, yet, 
warned by an unerring instinct, they reunite in autumn to 
form an army. 
