PLATE XCVII. 
to the tail: all the Jins, and also the tail, are of a fine scarlet; but 
the colours and beauty of the rest of the body, which is smooth and 
covered with almost imperceptible scales, beggars all description : the 
upper part being of a bright green, variegated with whitish spots," 
and enriched with a shining golden hue, like the splendour of ^ 
peacock’s feather : this by degrees vanishes in a bright silvery, and 
near the belly the gold again predominates in a lighter ground than 
on the back.” 
t f 
Tire third specimen, which, as before observed, was taken in 
Torbay, in the year 1772, is thus described by Mr. Pennant, upon 
the authority of a gentleman who saw the fish soon after it was 
taken, and transmitted an account of it to be inserted in the British 
Zoology, — “ This fish weighed a hundred and forty pounds. The 
length was four feet and a half : the breadth two feet and a quarter : 
the greatest thickness only four inches. Its general colour was a 
vivid transparent scarlet varnish over burnished gold, bespangled with 
oval silver spots of various sizes : the breaft was a hard bone, re- 
sembling the keel of a ship. The flesh looked, and tasted like beef.” 
Several of the French Naturalists describe the Opah either under 
the name of Poisson de Lune, after Duhamel, or the more mo- 
dern appellation of Chrysosiose Lune, (Chrysostosus) which latter 
was assigned to it by Lacepede, when he separated it fiom the Zeus 
genus, in which it stands in the Gmelinian Linn. Syst. and constituted 
a new genus for the reception of this single species, Bose, one of 
the latest of those writers, affords a lively description of the Opah, 
in the following words. “ C’est un magnifique poisson. Des reflet® 
d’azur, de vert clair, d’argent, se jouent sur un fond d’or, au milieu 
d’un grand nonibre de taches couleur de pole ou de saphir. Le® 
