PISCES 141 



very large number of eel-like fishes which are in all probability 

 polyphyletic in origin and have been placed in the same group 

 on account of possessing in common the attributes generally asso- 

 ciated with eels. The present writer would hazard the suggestion 

 that they may be degenerate derivatives of several groups of 

 fishes that have undergone the same type of racial degeneration; 

 thus the Apodes present a situation comparable with that of the per- 

 ennibranchiate Amphibia, a group now adjudged to be of polyphyletic 

 origin and paedogenetic in character. It seems not unlikely that the 

 eels are the victims of racial retardation, due to some kind of develop- 

 mental defect that inhibits the normal differentiation of the anterior 

 parts of the primary axis and that of the bilateral appendages. Some 



Fig. 7S. — ^Eel or Moray, Gymnothrax waialua, from Hawaii (after Jordan and 

 Evermann.) 



of the eels show still more radical distortions of the generalized fish 

 proportions in having excessively elongated bodies, as is the case in the 

 Thread-eel (Nematichihys), which one can hardly believe to be a fish 

 at all. Almost as remarkable are the Gulper-eels (Fig. 74, C), abysmal 

 forms with enormous head and mouth and a much attenuated body 

 ending in a filamentous tail. Of these Dr. Gill says: — "The entire 

 organization is peculiar to the extent of anomaly, and our old con- 

 ceptions of a fish require to be modified in the light of our knowledge of 

 such strange beings." The Morays, a great family of marine eels, are 

 predaceous fishes of great efficiency, with highly developed teeth and 

 often with color patterns strikingly elaborate and brilliant. These 

 patterns often simulate those of snakes, as in the banded species, 

 Gymnothorax (Fig. 78); it is said that they are often quite 

 poisonous. 



