FISH IN PALESTINE 417 
Mediterranean fresh-water fauna, two in the Nile, seven in the 
Tigris, Euphrates, and adjacent rivers, ten in other parts of 
Syria, while sixteen are quite peculiar to the basin of the 
Jordan. The fish fauna is very isolated, but shows affinities 
to that of the Ethiopian zoo-geographical region, and probably 
dates from a geological time when the Jordan and the rivers 
of North-East Africa belonged to the same system. 
Of these fish, two demand notice. 
(1) Chromis simonis. In the rare instances where fish 
take any care of their eggs or young, the task nearly always 
devolves on the male ; here, the husband performs it by taking 
the ova into his mouth, till their development in the large 
cheek-pouches causes such swelling that he is unable to use 
his mouth. This uncomfortable condition éxists and increases 
until as fry about four inches long they quit the paternal abode.? 
(2) Claritas macracanthus, found in the Nile, as well as in 
the Lake of Gennesaret. In their spawning migration they 
have often to travel stretches of dwindling streams with water 
insufficient to cover them, or absent altogether. By means 
of an accessory bronchial organ they can live at least two 
whole days out of water. When they thus behold all the 
wonders of terrestrial existence, including its choicest perfec- 
tion, Man, is it surprising that they “utter a squeaking or 
hissing sound,” or ¢este Masterman, ‘ cat-like squeak ”’ ? 
1 Dr. Boulenger points out, however, that the affinity between the two 
rivers is restricted to a few species of the Silurids and Cichlids, whose importance 
is outweighed by the total absence from the Jordan of such characteristic 
African families as the Polypteridz, Mormyridz, and Characinide. 
2 This statement of Tristram’s is controverted by Masterman, op. cit., p. 44, 
note 1, who writes, ‘‘This is impossible. They leave the shelter of their 
fathers’ mouths when about the size of a lentil, and apparently never return.” 
The male Pipe fish Syngnathus acus not only carries the eggs, but also 
the young fish in a pouch, in a manner similar to the kangaroo. The young, 
even after they have begun to swim about, return when alarmed to the 
parental cavity. There are only one or two instances of a female fish taking 
sole charge of the ova: of these is Aspreto batvachus, which by lying on the 
top of her eggs presses them in to her spongy body and carries them thus, till 
they are hatched. 
3 In islands off Northern Australia are found walking and climbing fish, 
Periophthalmus koelveuteri and P..austvalis, which ascend the roots of the 
mangrove by the use of ventral and pectoral fins, and jump and skip on the 
mud with the alertness of rabbits (The Confessions of a Beachcomber, p. 204, 
London, 1913). 
Ktesias, a possible contemporary of Herodotus, writes that in India are 
little fish whose habit it is now and then to have a ramble on dry land. 
