196 ACANTHOPTERYGII. — FISTULARIADuE. | 
red hue. The eyes are large and conspicuous; 
the irides are silvery^ streaked with red^ and the 
pupils are black. The scales are hard and rough, | 
granulated on the surface and beautifully ciliated, ! 
or cut into very delicate filaments on the hinder j 
edge, I 
Little is known of the habits of this singular 
little fish. According to Risso, it prefers a muddy 
bottom in moderately deep water, spawning in 
spring. The young are seen near the shore of the 
Mediterranean in autumn, shining with the silvery 
gleam already alluded to, they not having yet ac- 
quired the rich hue. of the adult state : they are 
not numerous, and do not wander far from the | 
locality in which they are bred. We have, how- | 
ever, seen the Snipe-fish under circumstances which | 
seem to imply very different habits from these. In 
a recent voyage to Jamaica, when about one hundred 
and sixty miles south west of Madeira, a little | 
Centriscus was taken alive in a bucket of water 
drawn from alongside; and on the same day a 
Bonito {Thynnus pelamys) was caught, the stomach | 
of which was filled with these Snipe-fishes, The | 
Bonito is well-known to be a surface-swimming 
fish ; and his morning meal having been exclusively 
made of the Centrisci, combines with the specimen 
taken in a bucket, to prove that the latter also is | 
a surface species, while the locality shows it to 
be pelagic. As all the individuals were alike in 
size, and none exceeded two inches and a half in 
length, it may have been a species distinct from [ 
the C. scolopax of the Mediterranean. 
The food of the Snipe-fish is not recorded by 
naturalists : Mr, Yarrell, however, speaking con- |l 
jecturally, says, “it probably consists of minute | 
