39 ° 
SPINY-FINNED GROUP. 
a variable number of flexible spines; the base of the pectorals are muscular; 
the pelvic Ans are united for a portion of their length; and the caudal tin has 
its lower border obliquely truncated. The species here figured ( I J . koelreuteri) 
has a wide range, being found in the Red Sea, the seas and on the coasts of India, 
where it ascends tidal rivers and estuaries, as well as in the Andamans, the Malay 
Archipelago, and the islands of the Pacific. Concerning their habits, Day writes 
that “these fishes, from the muscular development at the base of the pectoral 
fins, are able to use them for progression on mud or for climbing. It is a most 
curious sicrht to see P. schlosseri along the side of the Burmese rivers; at a 
distance the fishes appear like large tadpoles, stationary, contemplating all passing 
objects, or else snapping at flies or other insects; suddenly, startled by something, 
mud-skippers disporting (f nat. size). —After Hilgeudorf. 
away they go with a hop, skip, and a jump, either inland among the trees or on 
to the water like a flat stone or a piece of slate sent skimming by a schoolboy. 
They climb on to trees and large pieces of grass, leaves, and sticks, holding on by 
their pectoral fins exactly as if these were arms. Now and then they plant these 
firmly as organs of support, the same as one places one’s elbows on a table, then 
they raise their heads and take a deliberate survey of surrounding objects.” Of 
certain allied species, which he places in a genus apart, the same writer remarks 
that they are essentially mud-dwelling fish, and that if placed in a vessel of deep 
water they appear to be rapidly drowned. In all, the remarkable prominence of the 
eyes is more or less completely lost after death. On the slimy banks of the small 
affluents of the Hughli near Calcutta, where the writer has often watched their 
strange habits, these fishes may be seen in hundreds. 
