THE MAILED FISHES. 151 



garpike, and a very different fish indeed it is from the great, 

 harmless, peaceable sturgeon. 



It has a very large mouth, armed with large, conical, 

 sharp teeth, and the body is encased in an enamelled coat 

 of mail; the skeleton, including the skull, is bony, so as to 

 show some resemblance to the skeleton of the perch. 

 Gars are the terror of the Mississippi Eiyer and its 

 branches, as they destroy all the smaller fish. The largest 

 species is the alligator gar (Lepidosteus spatula), which is 

 sometimes nearly three yards (three metres) in length, 

 sometimes weighing several hundred pounds. So hard is 

 its armor that a blow with an axe cannot penetrate its 

 back, the only vulnerable point being its throat or the back 

 of its head. It inhabits the lower Mississippi and the stag- 

 nant bayous and sluggish streams entering it. The spawn 



Fio. 158.— Garpike. 



resembles that of the toad, forming long ropes several 

 inches in diameter, which are hung on old snags or 

 roots. The eggs are laid in December and January; the 

 young, appearing in the spring, become fourteen inches 

 long late in August. . 



The garpikes from some cause became confined to bodies 

 of fresh water only in North America, in Cuba and 

 in that part of the United States drained by the Missis- 

 sippi Valley, and to the great lakes. And we see why they 

 are such terrible engines of destruction among the smaller, 

 weaker fry: they have the heads and teeth of alligators, 

 their ferocity and cunning, and in their watery element they 

 are more formidable than sharks. Were it not that their 

 young can be eaten by other fish, they would exterminate 

 all other fi§h-Jif e aboTit them, Thus we see that the Ganoid 



