SWORDFISH. 
149 
found to have driven its sword through the double copper 
sheathing of a ship, and then through a plank of the thickness 
of two inches and a half, deep into one of the ship’s timbers, 
where it broke. We quote another instance, in which the 
editor speaks in his own person: — “We have had the pleasure 
of inspecting a piece of wood cut out of one of the fore 
planks of a vessel, (the Priscilla, from Pernambuco, now in the 
port of Liverpool,) through which was struck about eighteen 
inches of the bony weapon of the Swordfish. The force with 
which it must have been driven in affords a striking exempli- 
fication of the power and ferocity of the fish. The Priscilla is 
quite a new vessel. Captain Taylor, her commander, states 
that when near the Azores, as he was walking the quarter-deck 
at nio'ht, a shock was felt which brought all hands from below, 
under the impression that the ship had touched upon some 
rock. This was, no doubt, the time when the occurrence took 
place.” 
“Nor bumisbed steel, nor plates of flaming brass, 
In solid work the fishy snout surpass.” 
Oppian. 
The flesh of the Swordfish is thought delicious, and Linnseus, 
who met with it in Norway, compared it in taste to the 
Salmon. To obtain it in the Mediterranean there is a regular 
fishery, which has been carried on from ancient times, and 
which, with some variation, is described in the poem of 
Oppian, B. iii. A man, who answers to the huer already 
mentioned in our account of the Tunny fishery, is stationed in 
some elevated place, where he can discern the course and 
motions of the expected fish, and from whence he^ can com- 
municate with the fishermen afloat, whose course is directed 
by his signals. The excitement of the chase is highly amusing, 
and much skill is shewn in use of the dart with which the 
flesh is struck, and which is fastened to a line that is 
suffered to run out, but is tightened to restrain the exertions of 
the fish. What follows is a counterpart, on a small scale, of 
what is practised in the Whale fishery; and the time and 
patience engaged in the efforts to obtain the prize are spoken 
of as not a little considerable. 
Oppian describes another and a very ingenious practice, that 
