1889. [ Wa/ks Under the Sea by a Coral Strand. 945 
the reef, the mere naming of which would read Uke the inventory 
of a museum. 
The sea fans {Gorgonia flabellunt) are not to be mistaken. They 
stand erect, firmly anchored to the stony floor, and are forever re- 
peating the slow undulating movements of the water. Their lace- 
like texture distinguishes them at once from the related " sea- 
feathers" {Pterogorgia), whose graceful nodding plumes, sometimes 
six feet tall, are the branching foliage trees of the coral garden. 
Fish swim amid the waving fans, and thread the maze of the 
coral caves, as much at home as the birds in the neighboring bush, 
and far surpass the latter in the brilliancy of their colors. It is 
a memorable though common sight to meet a school of fish 
moving leisurely over the reef Through the softened light and 
clear perspective of the water you see a hundred shining forms 
pass slowly across the painted screen, amid lilac fans and coral- 
sculptured rocks. Some are armored with a coat of burnished 
cerulean scales, or banded with black and blue, or, like the gro- 
tesque trunk-fish {Ostracion\ dappled with a variety of tints. A 
blue fish (not the market fish, but a very different and very much 
bluer species, from whose iridescent, cobalt scales, the natives of 
New Providence make pretty ornaments) may be seen lazily 
swimming over a sand-bottom, which they frequently probe with 
their blunt noses, their bright coats gleaming with every lash of 
the tail and movement of the body. 
The tiirbot, as he passes, ogles you with his large, glassy eye, 
or pokes his inquisitive nose into a sponge, — an odd fish from 
every point of view. He is about as broad as long, and has an 
Ugly looking mouth with projecting teeth, and a deeply forked 
tail, the ends of which are drawn out into long streamers. The 
dorsal fin is peculiar, and has given rise to its nickname, the " trig- 
ger-fish." By a simple anatomical arrangement, the foremost 
spme of this fin, which is a sharp, dagger-like weapon, when once 
erect cannot be pressed down, but touch the smaller spine next 
to It, and down it falls like the trigger to a gun. 
Perhaps one of the most striking fish we meet on a coral reef, 
although it is hard to decide which is the most striking, is the 
" hog fish," as it is called by fishermen on account of the grunt- 
