BONITOES AND TUNNIES. 
207 
The Bonito does not appear to have been abundant in former years ; it 
attracted but little attention in our waters before i860, although it was 
alluded to in 1815 by Mitchill, in 1842 by DeKay, and in 1856 by Gill; 
none of these authors, however, regarded it as a common form, or cited 
any considerable number of instances of its presence. 
A note from Prof. J. Hammond Trumbull states: “This fish used to 
be quite common, in some years, in the Stonington market. I have a 
note of a considerable number in market July 22, 1842, their first appear¬ 
ance for the season.” 
Storer remarked in 1846: “This species, called by the fishermen in 
Boston market the ‘ Skipjack,’ and by those at the extremity of Cape 
Cod the ‘ Bonito/ is very rarely met with in Massachusetts Bay. It is 
occasionally taken at Provincetown, and even at Lynn. At some seasons 
it is frequently caught at Martha’s Vineyard with trailing bait.” 
One of these fishes is a marvel of beauty and strength. Every line in 
its contour is suggestive of swift motion. The head is shaped like a 
minie bullet, the jaws fit together so tightly that a knife-edge could 
scarcely pass between, the eyes are hard, smooth, their surfaces on a per¬ 
fect level with the adjoining surfaces. The shoulders are heavy and 
strong, the contours of the powerful masses of muscle gently and evenly 
merging into the straighter lines in which the contour of the body slopes 
back to the tail. The dorsal fin is placed in a groove into which it is 
received, like the blade of a clasp knife in its handle. The pectoral and 
ventral fins also fit into depressions in the sides of the fish. Above and 
below, on the posterior third of the body, are placed the little finlets, each 
a little rudder with independent motions of its own, by which the course 
of the fish may be readily steered. The tail itself is a crescent-shaped 
oar, without flesh, almost without scales, composed of bundles of rays 
flexible, yet almost as hard as ivory. A single sweep of this powerful oar 
doubtless suffices to propel the Bonito a hundred yards, for the polished 
surfaces of its body can offer little resistance to the water. I have seen 
a common dolphin swimming round and round a steamship, advancing at 
the rate of twelve knots an hour, the effort being hardly perceptible. The 
wild duck is said to fly seventy miles in an hour. Who can calculate the 
speed of the Bonito? It might be done by the aid of the electrical con¬ 
trivances by which is calculated the initial velocity of a projectile. The 
Bonitoes in our sounds to-day may have been passing Cape Colony, or 
the Land of Fire, day before yesterday. 
