168 
Wild Life in Southern Seas. 
deep water, and certainly do prey upon rock- 
cod, crabs, etc., that are never found in shallow 
water. Then, too, they are semi-nocturnal feeders, 
which is not the case of the ordinary albicore 
or bonita, and at times take a bait on a moon¬ 
light night, although they bite best at dusk or 
dawn, and, indeed, will occasionally follow the 
baited line almost to the surface in broad daylight. 
Especially is this so with a certain variety 
of the species which are found in the deep 
lagoon islands of the Marshall Group, such as 
Maduro and Arnhu Atolls ; these sometimes 
attain an enormous size, scaling up to loolb. 
and 1501b. But they grow even to greater 
weights than this, according to native accounts, 
and I was shown the skull of one caught on 
Pleasant Island in 1891, which a local trader 
assured me was over 6ft. in length, “ with 
a body as thick as a young cow.” When 
hooked they make the most desperate attempts 
to free the hook by a series of violent head- 
shakings, after the manner of the tarpon of 
Florida. Sometimes they will make a straight 
dart upwards at a great speed, and then, slew¬ 
ing round with lightning-like rapidity, dive 
almost vertically, snapping a hook or line 
