110 
PILOT FISH. 
descriptions left ns of its sli9.pe and size are insufficient and 
contradictory; and the figure given by Euysch, in his “Theatrum 
omnium Animalium,” pi. iv, f. 4, of the fish which he terms 
Mijsticetus Balence Dux, acknowledged from Aldrovandus, is 
wholly imaginary. Modern observation therefore has failed in 
recognising this Guide or Pilot by any other character than 
that implied by its name; but it is only necessary for us to 
substitute the Shark in the place of the Whale to enable us to 
discover how fittingly the history answers to the fish we are 
speaking of. 
It is the firm belief of sailors that such a fish is known to 
them; and that it ventures to be in close companionship with 
those ferocious inhabitants of the ocean without fear or danger, 
and even with signs of attachment; while the Sharks also seem 
conscious of a sympathetic feeling for their little fiicnd. This 
widely-spread belief is remarkably corroborated by the narrative 
of the late Lieutenant-Colonel C. Hamilton Smith, who himself 
was well known as an eminent naturalist, as the Captain Richards 
he mentions was also a man of unquestionable truth, and a 
correct observer. It was in the Mediterranean that, on a fine 
day, a Blue Shark followed the ship, attracted perhaps by a 
corpse which had been commited to the waves. After some 
time a Shark-hook, baited with pork, was flung out. The Shark, 
attended by four Pilot Pishes, repeatedly approached the bait, 
and every time he did so one of the Pilot Pishes, preceding 
him, was distinctly seen from the taffrail of the ship, to run 
his snout against the side of the Shark’s head, and turn it away. 
After some further play the fish swam off in the wake of the 
vessel, his dorsal fin being long distinctly visible above the 
water. When he had gone, however, a considerable distance, 
he suddenly turned round, darted after the vessel, and before 
the Pilot Pish could overtake him and interpose, snapped at the 
bait and was taken. In hoisting him up one O’f the Pdot Pishes 
was observed to cling to his side until he was half above water, 
when it fell off. All the Pilot Fishes then swam about awhile, 
as if in search of their friend, with every apparent mark of 
anxiety and distress, and afterwards darted suddenly down into 
the depths of the sea. The Colonel believed these observations 
on the Pilot Pish to be perfectly correct, as he had himself 
watched with intense curiosity an event in all respects precisely 
