442 WINGED FLYING FISH. Class IV. 



it leads a most miserable life. In its own 

 element it is perpetually harassed by the Do- 

 rados, and other fishes of prey. If it endea- 

 vours to avoid them by having recourse to the 

 air, it either meets its fate from the Gulls, or 

 the Albatross, or is forced down again into the 

 mouth of the inhabitants of water, who below 

 keep pace with its aerial excursion. Neither is 

 it unfrequent that whole shoals of them fall on 

 board of ships that navigate the seas of warm 

 climates : it is therefore apparent, that nature in 

 this creature hath supplied it with instruments 

 that frequently bring it into that destruction it 

 strives to avoid, by having recourse to an ele- 

 ment unnatural to it. 



The antients were acquainted with this spe- 

 cies : Pliny mentions it under the name of Hi- 

 rundo, and speaks of its flying faculty. It is 

 probable that Oppian intended the same by his 

 ilKsiai xzxtiwzs, or the swift swallow fish. What 

 AthencEus and the last cited author mean by the 

 E%oy.orro; and ASaivis, is not so evident : they assert 

 it quitted the water and slept on the rocks, from 

 whence it tumbled with precipitation when dis- 

 turbed by the unfriendly birds : on these ac- 

 counts Ichthyologists seem to have made it sy- 

 nonymous with the flying fish. 



