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that they may be used in the readiest manner in the direction from which an 
attack is likely to come. The attack on the Lancet fishes feeding on sea-weed, 
can hardly be made except in the rear, and thus they have their very sharp and 
powerful weapons upon the sides of the tail, not far from the origin of the caudal 
fin. The Weevers, again, and fishes of similar habit, which lie at the bottom of 
the shallows and feed there, have their defensive weapons in the dorsal fin, or 
sometimes on the head ; and they repel their enemies by striking upwards with a 
violent rising motion of the body; whereas, the surface fishes strike laterally with 
the tail or the side of the head, according to the situation of their defensive weapons. 
It is not understood, however, that any one weapon of this kind with which a fish 
is armed upon any part of the body, is ever used for offensive purposes. Animals, 
in fact, whether they inhabit the land or the water, have never any weapons of 
mere warfare in the way of attack ; their offensive weapons are given them for the 
purpose of obtaining their food; and when this purpose is accomplished, the 
animals repose, and are at peace with all the world. 
Fishes whose habit it is to swim freely through the water without much 
ascending or descending, have always the posterior pair of fins on the under side, 
abdominal, or placed backwards ; though many which have this form are ground 
fishes. It is to be understood, however, that this arrangement of the fins gives 
the fishes more command of the waters, in freedom of range, than those which 
have them differently situated. The Salmon may be taken as a common or 
abridged type of this form of fishes, and it is exceedingly discursive. The Her¬ 
ring also, and all the herring family have a similar arrangement of the fins ; and 
they too are remarkable for the distance to which they can range. If ascent and 
descent are more the motions of the fish, the second pair of fins on the under part 
are placed forwards ; sometimes immediately under the pectoral fins, and some¬ 
times in advance of them. By this means the fish has great command over the 
head, in ascending or descending ; and in such fishes the head is usually large in 
proportion, and the mass of the body concentrated on the fore part. The cod 
family are examples of this ; and, though they differ a good deal from each other, 
they may be all considered as ground fishes, or opposite in their habits to the free 
swimmers, which have the second pair of their fins abdominal. Such fishes do 
not inhabit the shallows near the shore, but the banks and the surfaces of the 
rocks out at sea. They are exceedingly numerous in localities suited to them; 
and in point of numbers, and also in the lightness and wholesomeness of their 
flesh, they are among the most valuable tenants of the deep. The true fishes of 
the shallows, which keep and feed near the ground, are the flounder family, or flat 
fish as they are called; they are, perhaps, the least discursive of the fishes. There 
is a peculiarity in the structure of their spine which is possessed by no other 
animal. The vertebrae, of what may be considered as the neck, have a twist to the 
right hand in some of the genera, and to the left hand in others; so that the eyes 
