156 
NATURAL J'lSTORY. 
ray, or fire-flare, which seems to be the dread of even the 
boldest and most experienced fishermen. The spine, with 
■which it wounds its adversaries, is not venomous as has 
been vulgarly supposed, but is, in fact, a weapon of offence- 
belonging to this animal, and capable, from its barbs, of 
inflicting a very terrible wound, attended with dangerous 
symptoms ; it is fixed to the tail, as a quill is into the tail 
of a fowl, and is annually shed in the same manner. 
The Torpedo is equally formidable and well known 
with the former; but the manner of its operating is to this 
hour a mystery to mankind. The body of this fish is 
almost circular, and thicker than others of the ray kind ; 
the skin is soft, smooth, and of a yellowish colour, marked, 
as all the kind, with large annular spots ; the eyes very 
small ; the tail tapering to a point; and the weight of the 
fish from a quarter to fifteen pounds. Redi found one 
twenty-four pounds weight. To all outward appearance, 
it is furnished with no extraordinary powers ; it has no 
muscles formed for particularly great exertions; no internal 
conformation perceptibly differing from the rest of its kind ; 
yet such is that unaccountable power it possesses, that, the 
instant it is touched, it numbs not only the hand and arm, 
but sometimes also the whole body, the shock received, 
by all accounts, much resembles the stroke of an electrical 
machine; sudden, tingling, and painful. “The instant,” 
says Kempfer, “I touched it with my hand, I felt a terrible 
numbness in my arm, and as far up as the shoulder. Even 
if one treads upon it with the shoe on, it affects not only 
the leg, but the whole thigh upwards. Those who touch 
it with the foot, are seized with a stronger palpitation than 
even those who touch it with the hand. This numbness 
bears no resemblance to that which we feel when a nerve 
is a long time pressed and tlie foot is said to be asleep ; it 
rather appears like a sudden vapour, which, passing through 
the pores, in an instant penetrates to the very springs of 
life, whence it diffuses itself over the whole body, and gives 
real pain. The nerves are. so affected, that the person 
struck imagines all the bones of his body, and particularly 
those of the limb that received the blow, are driven out of 
joint. All this is accompanied with an universal tremor, a 
sickness of the stomach, a general convulsion, and a total 
suspension of the faculties of the mind.” 
Though we are ignorant of the nature of the torpedo, 
yet we have some facts which relate to the manner of its 
acting. Reaumur, who made several trials upon this ani- 
mal, has at least convinced the world that it is not neces- 
