S 84 
KAMAKICHI KISHINOÜYE : 
to make a large circuit if they intend to take food again near the same spot 
as before. Generally they hesitate to swallow food, when it is too large for 
a mouthful. As a rule they pursue food into shallower strata than those they 
are accustomed to. While feeding, fishes in a school swim in different direc¬ 
tions as they like. A fish which has taken plenty of natural food, is easier 
enticed to baited hooks than one with an empty stomach. This may bs ex¬ 
plained by the fact that the fish become frenzied from competition when feed¬ 
ing in a school, and bite any object, suspended or moving in the water, but 
when they are not feeding they are rather shy and suspicious, and thus do not 
easily bite baited hooks. When tunnies bite baited hooks, they swim down¬ 
ward at once very quickly, about 200 m, more or less obliquely, so that tunnv- 
fishermen are provided with a strong line, longer than 200 m. 
DEVELOPMENT AND GROWTH. 
The development of mackerels and certain seerfishes can be studied ; but 
that of the plecostean fishes is very difficult to study, as these fishes do not 
approach the land, at least in the spawning season. I have not yet succeeded 
in obtaining these fishes with mature reproductive elements. Consequently the 
larval and postlarval fishes of the Plecostei are still unknown. Two small 
specimens described and figured by Lütken (53) and identified to be the young 
of Tkunnus alalonga are the smallest examples, so far as I know; but most 
probably they do not belong to the Plecostei, as the foremost spine of the first 
dorsal is remarkably shorter than succeeding spines. They would most probably 
be immature forms of the Cybiidae, as the jaws ai e long and the teeth large. An 
immature specimen caught in a tow-net during the Challenger Expedition, be¬ 
tween the Admiralty Islands and Japan, and described by Günther (32) is 
probably a plecostean fish. 
In May, immature fishes of Scomber japonicus about 45 mm in length are 
caught together with colourless fries of the sardine, anchovy, etc. near the coast 
on the Pacific side. These immature fishes 
have slenderer body, rounded snout, teeth in 
the lower jaw in two rows, but remarkably few 
in number. In September they grow to the Fig ' R Scomher Kat size - 
length of about 12 cm, in October 15 cm, and when one year old to 18 cm. I am 
