292 Fish Stories 



search of anything that he may eat. As he may eat any- 

 thing, he always finds it. His appetite is as impartial as 

 that of a goat. Anything, from a dead lamprey or a bunch 

 of sunfish eggs to a piece of tomato can, is grateful to him. 

 In each of the fins, which represent his arms, is a long, 

 sharp bone with a slimy surface and a serrated edge. These 

 are fastened by a ball-and-socket joint, and whenever the 

 fish is alarmed, the bone is whirled over and set in place; 

 then it sticks out stiffly on each side. There is another such 

 bone in the fin on the back, and when all of these are set 

 there is no fish that can swallow him. 



When he takes the hook, which he surely will do if there 

 is any hook to be taken, he will swallow it greedily. As 

 he is drawn out of the water he sets his three spines, and 

 laughs to himself as the boy pricks his fingers trying to get 

 the hook from his stomach. This the boy is sure to do, and 

 because the boy of the Mississippi Valley is always fishing 

 Ifor catfish is the reason why his fingers are always sore. 

 ,The catfish is careless of the present, and sure of the 

 ifuture. After he is strung on a birch branch and dried in 

 the sun and sprinkled with dust, and has had his stomach 

 dug out to recover the hook, if he falls into the brook he 

 will swim away. He holds no malice, and is ready to bite 

 again at the first thing in sight. 



The catfish uses his lungs as an organ of hearing. The 

 needless lung becomes a closed sac filled with air, and com- 

 monly known as the swimming bladder. In the catfish (as 

 in the suckers, chubs and most brook fishes) the air bladder 

 is large, and is connected by a slender tube, the remains of 

 the trachea, to the oesophagus. At its front it fits closely to 

 the vertebral column. The anterior vertebrae are much 

 enlarged, twisted together, and through them passes a chain 

 of bones which connect with the hidden cavity of the air. 

 The air bladder therefore assists the ear of the catfish as the 

 tympanum and its bones assist the ear of the higher animals. 

 An ear of this sort can carry little range of variety in sound. 



