326 



The Barracouta 



brought up in the trawl from immense depths is well 

 known. And not oM^re forms either, like the majority 

 of the deep-down fish, but familiar flat fish such as 

 soles and flounders. It would seem as if the peculiar 

 shape exactly fitted them for the strange conditions 

 of pressure and the necessity for concealment which 

 certainly are characteristic of profound ocean depths. 

 But it is not to be expected that, however valuable 

 as food the fish may be, any fishery can be profitably 

 carried on which necessitates the working of the 

 gear at such great depths. It is altogether too tedious 

 and expensive to be profitable. Therefore the in- 

 habitants of ocean's profundities are likely to remain 

 undisturbed by man until the end of things, although 

 it be unsafe to prophesy. 



I conclude my remarks on fish by a short account 

 of an extraordinary day's sport I once had on the top 

 of a mountain (a submerged one, of course) in the 

 middle of the South Pacific, as showing how colonies 

 of fish are formed in apparently the most unlikely 

 oases, if one may call them so, of ocean. This particular 

 place was well to the north of New Zealand, and some- 

 where in the deepest part yet discovered of the ocean. 

 I do not know its exact position, but I heard the 

 skipper say that it was part of a mountain range 

 to which the Himalayas must 3deld place for height, 

 and so I suppose it must have been part of the 

 Kermadec Group. 



One afternoon, as we sailed gently along before a 

 very light breeze, we suddenly noticed a change in 

 the colour of the water, an infallible sign of shallowing 

 or of a shoal of fish. And as we entered upon the 

 discoloured area of sea, which came so abruptly that 

 the edge of the deep blue was very plainly marked, 

 the wind died away to a flat calm. The deep-sea 



