chapter I

intend following these invisible agents of fertility and life, as they lightly ascend from the tropical seas, and accompanying them in their various transformations, until they once more return to the bosom of their great parent. A cursory view of the benefits they confer on the vegetable and animal world, as they wander over the surface of the land, will, I hope, agreeably occupy the reader, and serve to increase his admiration for that deep and dark blue ocean without which all organic life would soon be extinct upon earth.

I begin with a few words on the winged carriers of marine exhalations, the _winds_, which, although now and then detrimental or fatal to individuals by their violence, largely compensate for these local injuries, by the constant and inestimable benefits they confer on the whole body of mankind.

On taking a comprehensive view of their origin, we find that, like the oceanic currents, they are chiefly caused by the unequal influence of solar warmth upon the atmosphere under the line and at the poles. In the torrid zone, the air, rarefied by intense heat, ascends in perpendicular columns high above the surface of the earth, and there flows off towards the poles, in the same manner as in a vase filled with cold water and placed over the flame of a lamp, the warmed liquid rises from the bottom and spreads over the surface.

But cold air-currents must naturally come flowing in an opposite direction from the poles to the equator to fill up the void, as in the example I have cited, colder and consequently heavier water comes streaming down the sides of the vase to replace the liquid which is rising in the centre under the influence of heat.

Thus the unequal distribution of solar warmth over the surface of the earth evidently generates a constant circulation of air from the equator to the poles, and from the icy regions to the tropics, and by this means the purity of the atmosphere is chiefly maintained. The sun is not only the great fountain of warmth, he is also the universal ventilator; he not only calls forth animal life, but at the same time, by a simple and admirable mechanism, provides for its health by constantly renewing the air, which is essential to its existence.

If caloric were the sole agent which influences the direction of the winds, or if the earth were one uniform plain, the opposite air-currents I have mentioned would naturally flow straight to the north and south; but their course is modified or diverted in the same manner as that of the ocean-currents by the rotation of the globe. Thus, the cold air-current (polar-stream) which comes rushing upon us from the Arctic regions, is felt in our latitude as the biting east or north-east wind, so trying to our nerves and organs of respiration, while we enjoy the warm air-current from the tropics as the mild western or south-western breeze.

But besides the rotation of the earth, there are many other local influences by which the winds are deflected from their course, or by whose agency partial air-currents are called forth. Among these we

## particularly notice high chains of mountains, the unequal capacity of

sea and land in absorbing and retaining heat, which gives rise to sea and land breezes; the increasing or diminishing power of the sun in different seasons by which the equilibrium of the air is modified in many countries, the difference of radiation from a sandy desert or a forest, electrical discharges from clouds, &c. &c.

Although subject to many of these local disturbances, the winds generally blow with an astonishing regularity in the tropical zone; while in our variable climate the polar and equatorial stream are engaged in a perpetual strife, now bringing us warmth and moisture from the south and west, now cold and dryness from the north and east.

Thus, in the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean we find the trade-winds perpetually blowing from the east, the north-east trade-wind between 9° and 27° N. lat., and the south-east trade-wind between 3° N. lat. and 25° S. lat. It was by their assistance that Columbus was enabled to discover America, and that the wretched barks of Magellan traversed the wide deserts of the Pacific from end to end.

Between these two regions of the trade-winds lies the dreaded zone or girdle of the equatorial calms (doldrums), where long calms alternate with dreadful storms, and the sultry air weighs heavily upon the spirits.

"Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down, 'Twas sad as sad could be; And we did speak, only to break The silence of the sea.

"Day after day, day after day, We stuck, nor breath, nor motion, As idle as a painted ship Upon a painted ocean."

On their polar limits, the trade-wind zones are again girdled with calm belts, the _horse latitudes_, whose mean breadth is from ten to twelve degrees. The boundaries of these alternating regions of winds and calms are not invariably the same, on the contrary, they are perpetually moving to the north or south, according to the position of the sun.

From 40° N. lat. to the pole, westerly winds begin to be prevalent, and in the Atlantic Ocean their proportion to the easterly winds is as two to one.

In the Northern Indian Ocean and in the Chinese Sea we also find the trade-wind, which is there called the _north-east monsoon_; here, however, it only blows from October to April, as during the summer terrestrial influences prevail which completely divert it from its course.

From the wide plains of central Asia glowing with the rays of a perpetually unclouded sun, the rarefied air rises into the higher regions. Other columns of air rush from the equator to fill up the void, and cause the trade-wind to vary its course, and change into the _south-western monsoons_ of the Indian Ocean, which blow from May to September. The regularly alternating monsoons materially contributed to the early development of navigation in the Indian seas, and conducted the Greeks and Romans as far as Ceylon, Malacca, and the Gulf of Siam. Similar monsoons, or deflections from the ordinary course of the trade-winds, occur also in the Mexican Gulf, in the Gulf of Guinea, and in that part of the Pacific which borders on Central America, through the influence of the heated plains of Africa, Utah, Texas, and New Mexico.

The passage from one monsoon to the other is of course only gradual, since the land also is only gradually heated and cooled. Thus at the change of the monsoon, an atmospheric war of several weeks' continuance occurs, during which the trade-wind and the monsoon measure their strength, and calms alternate with dreadful storms (typhoons, cyclones, tornadoes).

According to the researches and observations of Franklin, Cooper, Redfield, Reid, &c. &c., these storms are great rotatory winds, that move along a curved line in increasing circles. In the northern hemisphere, the rotatory movement follows a direction contrary to that of the hands of a clock; while the opposite takes place in the southern hemisphere. The knowledge of the laws which regulate the movements of storms is of great importance to the mariner, since it points out to him the direction he has to give his ship to gain the external limits of the tornado, and thus to remove it from danger.

_Water-spouts_ are formed by two winds blowing in opposite directions, and raising or sucking up the water in their vortex. They generally form a double cone; the superior part with its apex downwards, consisting of a dense cloud, while the inferior cone, the apex of which is turned upwards, consists of water, which is thus sometimes raised to a height of several hundred feet.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

Water-spouts seldom last longer than half-an-hour. Their course and movements are irregular; straight forwards; in zig-zag lines; alternately rising and falling; stationary; slow; or progressing with the rapidity of thirty miles an hour. The rotatory movement is also variable; its power is often very great, but sometimes water-spouts pass over small vessels without injuring them. They are more frequent near the coast than on the high seas; and are more commonly seen in warm climates. They seem to occur particularly in regions where calms frequently alternate with storms, which is not to be wondered at, since they owe their origin to miniature storms or whirlwinds.

[Illustration]

How do the aqueous vapours with which evaporation impregnates the atmosphere, again descend upon the surface of the earth?

Everybody knows that when in summer a bottle filled with cold water is brought into the room, it soon gets covered with thick dew-drops, which presently trickle down its sides, although it was perfectly dry on entering. Whence does this moisture come from? Not from the inside of the bottle as ignorant people might imagine, but from the surrounding atmosphere; in consequence of the capacity of the air to absorb and retain moisture, increasing or diminishing, as its temperature grows warmer or colder.

Thus when the cold bottle is introduced into the room, the warm sheet of air, which is in immediate contact with its surface, immediately cools, and being no longer able to retain all the moisture with which it was impregnated, is obliged to deposit it on the sides of the vessel. This familiar example suffices to explain the formation of dew, rain, hail, snow, hoar-frost, and all other atmospherical precipitations. They all result from the influence of some refrigerating cause upon the air; such as the passage of a warm current into a cooler region; the influx of a cold wind; a cold-radiating chain of high mountains; a forest, and so forth.

The very name of dew is refreshing, and calls forth a host of pleasing ideas, associated as it is with the memory of serene skies and sunny mornings. How beautiful are its diamonds glittering in all the colours of the rainbow, on verdant meads, or on the blushing petals of the rose. How suggestive of all that is lovely, pure, and innocent!

Poetry is of older date than prose, and bards have sung long before philosophers inquired. Thus, although the children of song from Homer and Theocritus to Byron and Wordsworth so frequently mention dew in their immortal strains, it is only in our time that its formation has been fully explained by Dr. Wells, who in a very ingenious and masterly essay on this subject, first proved that it results from the ground radiating or projecting heat into free space, and consequently becoming colder than the neighbouring air. During calm and clear nights, the upper surfaces of grass-blades, for instance, radiate their caloric into the serene sky, from which they receive none in return. The lower parts of the plant, being slow conductors of heat, can only transmit to them a small portion of terrestrial warmth, and their temperature consequently falling below that of the circumambient atmosphere, they condense its aqueous vapours. Clouds on the contrary compensate for the loss of heat the grass sustains from radiation, by reflecting or throwing back again upon the terrestrial surface, the caloric which would else have been dissipated in a clear sky, and this is the reason why dew does not fall, or but slightly falls during clouded nights. It is easy to conceive why none is formed in windy weather, as then the air in contact with the ground is constantly removed ere it has time to cool so far as to compel it to part with its moisture. We can also understand why dew is more abundant in autumn and spring than at any other season; as then very cold nights frequently follow upon warm days; and why it is most copious in the torrid zone, as in those sultry regions the air is more saturated with moisture than anywhere else, and the comparatively cold nights are almost constantly serene and calm. Hoar-frost is nothing but congealed dew, and owes its formation to the same causes.

When warmer air-currents are cooled by being transported into colder regions, or from any other refrigerating cause, a great part of their moisture generally condenses into small vesicles, but very little heavier than the surrounding atmosphere, which then becomes visible under the form of clouds, those great beautifiers of our changing skies, that frequently trace such picturesque, gorgeous, or singular groups and landscapes in the aërial regions. The inhabitants of countries where the heavens are monotonously serene, may well envy us the charms of a phenomenon which in some measure affords us compensation for so many disagreeable vicissitudes of the weather. Who that has admired at sunset the light clouds so beautifully fringed with silver and gold, or glowing with the richest purple, and loves to follow them in all their wonderful and fantastic transformations, will deny that they are the poesy and life of the skies, the awakeners of pleasing fancies and delightful reveries?

Thin wreaths of clouds have been observed, by travellers that have ascended the most elevated mountains, floating high above the peak of Chimborazo or Dhawalagiri, and thus shows us to what an amazing altitude the emanations of ocean are carried by the ascending air-current.

Sometimes when light clouds pass into a warmer atmosphere, they gradually dissolve and vanish; more frequently the accumulating moisture, too heavy to continue floating in the air, or condensed by electrical explosions, descends upon the earth in rain, which, with few exceptions, visits every part of the globe, either in its liquid form or congealed to snow or hail. But the quantity of rain which annually falls in different regions is very unequal, and strange to say, it is not most considerable in those countries whose climate enjoys an unenviable notoriety for its clouded atmosphere and the great number of its rainy days. In the tropical regions it is generally only about the time of the summer solstice that abundant showers of rain fall regularly every afternoon, while the rest of the year, the sky is uninterruptedly serene; but during the short period of the rainy season, a far greater quantity of water is precipitated upon the earth, than in the temperate zones.

While on the island of Guadaloupe, the annual quantity of rain amounts to 274·2 French inches, and to 283·3 at Mahabuleshwar, on the western declivity of the Ghauts, which, as far as has hitherto been ascertained, is the place where most rain descends; only from 35 to 40 inches fall on the western coast of England, where the skies are chronically weeping.

It is a remarkable circumstance that the annual quantity of rain which falls in the same place remains about the same from year to year; so that by an admirable balancing of conflicting influences, nature seems to have provided for stability in a province which of all others might be supposed most open to the caprices of chance.

Having thus followed the exhalations of ocean to the end of what may be called the first stage of their journey, and seen them descend in a condensed form upon the surface of the dry land, I will now accompany them in their ulterior progress to the bosom of the seas. A great part of them have many transformations and changes to undergo ere they can accomplish their return; repeatedly rising in vapours from the solid earth, and falling in showers upon its surface; or circulating through the tissues of organic life: but after all these intermediate stages and delays, they ultimately find their way into rivulets or streams, which after many a meander restore them to the vast reservoir from which they arose.

The waters that descend upon solid rocks, or fall in large quantities upon abrupt declivities, immediately flow into the brooks or rivers; but when they gently and gradually alight upon a porous soil, they are absorbed by the earth, and, displacing in virtue of capillary attraction, and of their superior weight, the air which fills the interstices between its solid particles, sink deeper and deeper until they meet with a solid and impenetrable stratum. If this forms a hollow basin, they naturally settle in the cavity; whence they are slowly displaced by fresh accessions and evaporation; but if its deepest declivity lies somewhere near the surface, they gradually gush forth under the form of sources or springs, having unequal distances to perform before they can reach the orifice. If no fresh supply of water falls, ere the most distant

## particles have reached their journey's end, the source dries up: but if

new atmospheric precipitations continually take place, the source is perennial, although naturally of unequal strength at different times.

The temperature of springs varies from icy coldness to boiling heat. Cold springs arise when the waters, by which they are fed, descend from high mountains or do not penetrate a great way into the bowels of the earth; but if the filtering waters reach a depth which is constantly of a higher temperature, they then gush forth in the form of warm or even boiling springs.

A crowd of agreeable associations attaches itself to the idea of sources and springs, for they are generally both pleasing and useful to man. How we long in summer for the refreshing waters of the cool fountain issuing from the mountain side, and murmuring through the woods. The lover of nature spends hours near some solitary spring, and forgets the flow of time, as he observes the bubbling and listens to the sweet music of its crystal waters. A luxuriant vegetation marks their progress, though all around be burnt up by the scorching sun. Along their margin many a wild flower blooms, and herbs and shrubs and trees rejoice in a more vivid green, and statelier growth. There also congregate such members of the finny race, as delight in cooler streams of untainted purity, and birds love to build their nests among the sheltering foliage. Thus a little world forms around the gushing spring, and shows on a diminutive scale, how all that lives and breathes depends upon the liquid element for its existence.

While the waters filter through the earth they naturally dissolve a variety of substances, and all springs are more or less mixed with extraneous particles. But many of them, particularly such as are of a higher temperature and consequently arise from deeper strata, contain either a larger quantity or so peculiar a combination of mineral substances as to acquire medicinal virtues of the highest order, and to become objects of importance to a large portion of mankind. Numberless invalids annually flock to the hygeian fountains which nature unceasingly pours forth from her mysterious laboratory, and are by them restored to the enjoyments of a pleasurable existence.

How truly wonderful is the chain of processes which first raises vapours from the deep, and eventually causes them to gush forth from the entrails of the earth, laden with blessings and enriched with treasures more inestimable than those the miner toils for!

Although a river generally has its source in mountainous regions, it must be remembered that all the waters that descend upon the territory of which it forms the lowest level, gradually find their way into its current. Thus, the monarch of all streams, the Amazon River, is the natural drain of a territory thirty times larger than England. Thousands of rivulets and brooks, fed by the waters which descend from the slopes of thousands of glens and valleys, or filter through the vast forest-plains that rise but a few feet above their surface, all contribute to swell the majesty of its current. Its sources are in reality wherever, on that vast extent of land, water descends and drains into any one of its innumerable affluents. When we hear that on an average the river of the Amazons alone restores every minute half a million of tons of water to the ocean, and then consider the countless number of streams all alike active, that are scattered over the globe, we may form a faint idea of the vast quantity of vapours which are constantly rising from the deep, and of the magnitude of these silent operations of nature. Yet such is the immensity of ocean, that supposing all the waters it constantly loses, never to return again into its bosom, it would require thousands of years of evaporation to exhaust the immensity of its reservoirs!

It might be supposed that the waters which congeal on the sides of mountains covered with perennial snow, or fill Alpine valleys in the form of glaciers, were eternally fixed on earth--but there also we are deceived by delusive appearances of immobility. Every year the glacier slowly but restlessly makes a step forwards into the valley, and while its lower end dissolves, new supplies of snow constantly feed it from above. It has been calculated by Agassiz that the ice masses of the Aar glacier require 133 years to perform their descent from its summit to its inferior extremity--a distance of ten miles--so that their sojourn in that chilled valley far surpasses that of the oldest patriarch of the mountains. How great must be their delight when they at last are liberated from the spell which so long enchained them, and freely bound along on their way to Ocean! How they must shudder at the idea of once more returning to their desolate prison, and long for the perpetual warmth of spicy groves and tropical gardens!

In the colder regions of the earth, in Greenland or Spitzbergen, immense glaciers frequently fill the valleys that open on the sea, descend even beyond the water's edge, and, as they move along, their overhanging masses separate from their base and plunge into the deep with a crash louder than thunder. The icebergs that drift about the Arctic seas, and are annually conveyed by the currents into lower latitudes, are formed in this manner. Huge blocks of granite, detached by atmospherical vicissitudes from the higher mountains and precipitated on the surface of the glaciers, frequently float on the broad back of an iceberg far away from the spot where they seemed rooted for eternity. As their crystal support melts away in its progress to warmer climes, these rocky fragments, which have been appropriately named _erratic blocks_, fall to the bottom of the sea hundreds or even thousands of miles from the starting point of their journey. Thus the great bank of Newfoundland is covered with stones from distant Greenland, raised high in the air by volcanic power myriads of years ago, and now condemned to an equally long repose below the surface of ocean. When will they rise again above the waters, and what further changes will they have to undergo ere their compacted atoms resolve themselves into dust and assume new forms? But, however remote their dissolution, it will inevitably come, for Time is all-powerful, and has an eternity to work out his changes.

The large blocks of stone that so wonderfully migrate on the wandering iceberg form but a small and insignificant portion of the terrestrial spoils which are transported to ocean by the returning waters. Every river is more or less laden with earthy particles which its current carries onwards to the sea and deposits at its mouth. In course of time their accumulation, as I have already mentioned, forms large tracts of fertile territory encroaching upon the maritime domains.

I shall end with a few words on the influence of forests in attracting or retaining the atmospherical moisture, as it is a subject of great importance in the economy of nations, and shows us how much it is in the power of man to improve or to defeat the provisions of nature in his favour.

Forests always cool the neighbouring atmosphere, for their foliage offers an immense warmth-radiating surface, so that the vapours readily condense above them and descend in frequent showers. At the same time their roots loosen the soil, and the successive falling of their leaves forms a thick layer of humus, which has an uncommon power in attracting and retaining moisture. Their thick canopy of verdure also prevents the rays of the sun from penetrating to the ground, and absorbing its humidity. Thus the soil on which forests stand is constantly saturated with water, and becomes the parent of perennial sources and rills, that spread fertility and plenty far from the spot where they originated.

The rain-attractive influence of forests did not escape the attention of Columbus, who ascribed the frequent showers which refreshed and cooled the air, as he sailed along the coasts of Jamaica, to the vast extent and density of the woods that covered the mountains of that island. On this occasion he mentions in his journal that formerly rain had been equally abundant on Madeira, the Canaries, and the Azores, before their shady forests were felled or burnt by the improvident settlers.

The wanton destruction of woods has entailed barrenness on countries renowned in former times for their fertility. The mountains of Greece were covered with trees during the great epoch of her history, and the well-watered land bore abundant fruits, and sustained a numerous population. But man recklessly laid waste the sources of his prosperity. Along with the woods, many brooks and rivulets disappeared, and ceased to water the parched plains. The rain gradually washed the vegetable earth from the sides of the naked hills, and condemned them to sterility. When the snow of the mountains began to thaw under the warm breath of spring, it was now no longer retained by the spongy soil of the forests, and gradually dissolved under their cover; but, rapidly melting, filled with its impetuous torrents the bed of the rivers, and overflowing their banks, spread ruin and devastation far around.

Unfortunately, forests when once destroyed are not so easily restored, and it requires many centuries ere the bared mountain side reassumes its pristine vesture of shady woods. First lichens, mosses, and other thrifty herbs, content to feed upon nothing, have to prepare a scanty humus for the reception of more pretentious guests. In course of time some small stunted shrub makes its appearance here and there in some peculiarly favoured spot, and after all requires vast powers of endurance to maintain itself on the niggard soil, exposed to the full enmity of wind and weather. This paves the way for a more vigorous and fortunate offspring; and as every year adds something to the vegetation on the mountain's side, and opposes increasing obstacles to the winds, the falling leaves and decaying herbage accumulate more and more, until dwarfish trees first find a sufficiency of soil to root upon, and finally, the proud monarch of the forest spreads out his powerful arms and raises his majestic summit to the skies.

While Greece and Asia Minor have seen their fertility decrease or vanish with the trees that once covered their hills, other countries have improved as their vast woods have been thinned by the axe of the husbandman. In the time of the Romans all Germany formed one vast and continuous forest, and its climate was consequently much more rigorous than it is at present. All the low grounds were covered with impervious morasses, and the winter is described by historians in terms like those we should employ to paint the cold of Siberia.

But the scene gradually changed as tillage usurped the sylvan domain. The excessive humidity of the soil diminished, the swamps disappeared, and the heat of the sea, penetrating into the bosom of the earth, developed its productive powers. Thus the chestnut and the vine now thrive and ripen their fruits on the banks of the Rhine and the Danube, where 2000 years ago they could not possibly have existed. But Germany would also see her fertility decline, if the destruction of the forests which still crown the brow of many of her hills should continue in a considerable degree. Numerous rivulets would then be dried up during the warm season, in consequence of the more rapid descent and thaw of vernal rains and wintry snows, and most likely, refreshing summer showers would be far less frequent. Even now the inundations which almost annually desolate the banks of the Elbe, the Oder, and the Rhine, are ascribed by competent judges to the excessive clearing of the forests in the mountainous countries where those rivers originate. These few examples suffice to prove to us the power of man in modifying the climates of the earth, and the vast importance of the study of terrestrial physics. By planting or destroying woods, he is able to compel nature to a more equitable distribution of her gifts. In marshy and low countries, he may remove the superfluous waters by drainage, and increase the productiveness of arid plains by judicious irrigation. Thus man is the lord and master of the earth; but hitherto he has done but little to reap all the advantages he might have obtained from his dominion, or even used it to his own detriment. Drainage, irrigation, and a judicious management of forest-lands, are only beginning to be understood even among the most enlightened nations. A great part of our damp island still remains undrained, and we allow the rivers of India to pour their waters into the sea, instead of diverting them upon her thirsty plains. But there can be no doubt that as knowledge increases, man will gradually learn to provide every soil with the exact measure of humidity that is requisite to make it bring forth its fruits in the greatest abundance. Views such as these teach us, that, far from having attained the summit of civilisation, we are still on the threshold of her temple, and that most likely our descendants will look down upon our present condition as we do upon that of our barbarous ancestors.

[Illustration: Rocky Mountains at the bend of Bear Lake River.]

CHAP. VII.

MARINE CONSTRUCTIONS.

Lighthouses.--The Eddystone.--Winstanley's Lighthouse, 1696.--The Storm of 1703.--Rudyerd's Lighthouse destroyed by Fire in 1755.--Singular Death of one of the Lighthouse Men.--Anecdote of Louis XIV.--Smeaton.--Bell Rock Lighthouse.--History of the Erection of Skerryvore Lighthouse.--Illumination Lighthouses.--The Breakwater at Cherbourg.--Liverpool Docks.--The Tubular Bridge over the Menai Straits.--The Sub-oceanic Mine of Botallack.

In one of the finest passages of "Childe Harold," Byron contrasts the gigantic power of the sea with the weakness of man. He describes the resistless billows contemptuously playing with the impotent mariner--now heaving him to the skies, now whelming him deep in the bosom of the tumultuous waters; he mocks the vain pride of our armadas, which are but the playthings of ocean, and points with a bitter sneer at the wrecks with which he strews his shores. A less misanthropic mood or a more truthful view of things might have prompted the wayward poet to celebrate the triumphs of man over the brute strength of the winds and waves; how, guided by the compass, he boldly steers through the vast waste of waters, how he excavates the artificial harbour, or piles up the breakwater to protect his bark against the destructive agencies of the billow and the storm, or how he erects the lighthouse to point out the neighbourhood of dangerous shoals or the entrance of the friendly port.

The various constructions planned and executed by man to disarm the turbulent or perfidious seas of a great part of their terrors, are indeed among the noblest monuments of his architectural genius, nor are any more deserving of universal applause and gratitude. Who has ever performed a winter voyage homewards over the wide Atlantic and not felt a thrill of delight when the first bright flash of light beamed over the dark waters and welcomed him back to his native isle? or what generous mind has ever experienced this feeling without devoting the tribute of its thanks to the wise and beneficent men whose energy and perseverance have succeeded in lighting every headland or estuary of our rugged coast? So completely has this been done, that in the dark and stormy night, almost as well as in the brightest day, the homeward-bound ship need not approach danger without receiving friendly warning, for her pathway is illuminated by gigantic fire-beacons so thickly set that when one fades to the sight a new one rises to the view.

Among the numerous lighthouses with which the genius of humanity has encircled our native shores, the Eddystone, the Bell Rock, and the Skerryvore, are pre-eminent for the vast difficulties that had to be surmounted in their construction, situated as they are upon solitary rocks, exposed to the full fury of the insurgent waves; and should by some revolution all other monuments erected by man be swept away from the surface of our land, and these alone remain, they would suffice to testify to future ages that these islands were once inhabited by a highly civilised and energetic race, one well worthy to lay claim to the dominion of the seas.

At the distance of about twelve miles and a half from Plymouth Sound, and intercepting, as it were, the entrance of the Channel, the Eddystone rocks had been for ages a perpetual menace to the mariner. The number of vessels wrecked on these perfidious shoals must have been terrible indeed, it being even now a common thing in foggy weather for homeward-bound ships to make the Eddystone Lighthouse as the first point of land of Great Britain, so that in the night and nearly at high water, when the whole range of the rocks is covered, the most careful pilot might run his ship upon them, if nothing was placed there by way of warning. As the trade of England increased, the number of fatal accidents naturally augmented, rendering it more and more desirable to crest the Eddystone with a tutelary beacon; yet years elapsed before an architect appeared bold enough to undertake the task. At length, in 1696, Mr. Winstanley, a country gentleman and amateur engineer, made the first attempt of raising a lighthouse on those sea-beaten rocks, but as he was possessed of more enterprise than solid knowledge, the structure he erected was deficient in every element of stability. Yet such was the presumption of the man that he was known to express a wish that the fiercest storm that ever blew might arise to test the solidity of the fabric. The elements took him at his word, for while on a visit of inspection to his lighthouse the dreadful storm of November 26, 1703, arose, the only storm which in our latitude has equalled the rage of a tropical hurricane. "No other tempest," says Macaulay in his Essay on Addison, "was ever in this country the occasion of a Parliamentary address or of a public fast. Whole fleets had been cast away. Large mansions had been blown down. One Prelate had been buried beneath the ruins of his palace. London and Bristol had presented the appearance of cities just sacked. Hundreds of families were still in mourning. The prostrate trunks of large trees and the ruins of houses still attested in all the southern counties the fury of the blast." No wonder that a tempest like this swept away the ill-constructed lighthouse like the "unsubstantial fabric of a vision," and that neither poor Mr. Winstanley nor any of his companions survived to recount the terrors of that dreadful night.

Strange to say, the task of rebuilding the Eddystone lighthouse, which was now felt as a national necessity, once more devolved, not upon a professed architect, but upon a Mr. Rudyerd, a linendraper of Ludgate Hill, the son of a Cornish vagrant, who had raised himself by his talents and industry from rags and mendicancy to a station of honourable competence. The choice, however, was not ill made, for, with the assistance of two competent shipwrights, the London tradesman constructed an edifice which, though mainly of timber, was so firmly bolted to the rock with iron branches that for nearly half a century it resisted the fury of the billows, and might have withstood them for many a year to come had it not been rapidly and completely destroyed by fire. This catastrophe, which happened on December 2, 1755, was marked by a strange accident, for while one of the light-keepers was engaged in throwing up water four yards higher than himself, a quantity of lead, dissolved by the heat of the flames, suddenly rushed like a torrent from the roof, and falling upon his head, face, and shoulders, burnt him in a dreadful manner. Having been conveyed to the hospital at Plymouth, he invariably told the surgeon who attended him, that he had swallowed part of the lead while looking upward; the reality of the assertion seemed quite incredible, for who could suppose it possible that any human being could exist after receiving melted lead into the stomach, much less that he should afterwards be able to bear the hardships and inconvenience from the length of time he was in getting on shore before any remedies could be applied. On the twelfth day, however, the man died, and having been opened a solid piece of lead, which weighed above seven ounces, was found in his stomach.[H]

[Footnote H: A full account of this extraordinary circumstance was sent to the Royal Society, and printed in vol. xlix. of their Transactions, p. 477.]

Another interesting anecdote is attached to the history of Rudyerd's lighthouse. Louis XIV. being at war with England while it was being built, a French privateer took the men at work upon it and carried them to France, expecting, no doubt, a good reward for the achievement. His hopes, however, were doomed to a grievous disappointment, for while the captives lay in prison, the transaction reached the ears of the monarch, who immediately ordered them to be released and the captors to be put in their place; declaring that though he was at war with England, he was not at war with mankind. He therefore directed the men to be sent back to their work with presents; observing that the Eddystone lighthouse was so situated as to be of equal service to all nations navigating the Channel. It is gratifying to meet with this trait of natural generosity in a mind long since obscured by the bigotry which prompted the revocation of the Edit de Nantes.

[Illustration: Eddystone Lighthouse.]

After these repeated disasters, the rebuilding of Eddystone lighthouse, in a more substantial manner than had hitherto been effected, was now no longer confided to amateur ingenuity, but to John Smeaton, an eminent civil engineer, one of those men who by originality of genius and strength of character are so well entitled to rank among the worthies of England. From his early infancy Smeaton (born May 28, 1724) gave tokens of the extraordinary abilities which were one day to render his name illustrious. Before he attained his sixth year his playthings were not the playthings of children but the tools which men employ: before he was fifteen he made for himself an engine for turning, forged his iron and steel, and had self-made tools of every sort for working in wood, ivory, and metals. At eighteen he by the strength of his genius acquired the art of working in most of the mechanical trades, and such was his untiring zeal that a part of every day was generally occupied in forming some ingenious piece of mechanism. In 1753, his various inventions and improvements had already attracted such notice that he was elected member of the Royal Society; and when, a few years later, the accident happened which burnt down the Eddystone lighthouse to the ground, he was at once fixed upon as the person most proper to rebuild it. A better choice could not possibly have been made, for Smeaton's lighthouse, firm as the rock on which it stands, has now already braved the storms of more than a century, and will no doubt continue to brave them for many ages to come. Of him it may well be said "exegit monumentum ære perennius," for to him is due the honour of having fixed the _best form_ to be given to a marine lighthouse, and even now the Eddystone beacon-tower remains a model which has hardly been surpassed by the taller and more graceful edifices of Bell Rock and Skerryvore. Nothing could exceed the patient ingenuity, the sagacity, and forethought with which that great engineer mortised his tall tower to the wave-worn rock, and then dove-tailed the whole together, so as to make rock and tower practically one stone, and that of the very best form for deadening the action of the wave. Nor must we forget that our great marine lighthouses, of which Smeaton gave the model, are as remarkable from an artistic as from a utilitarian point of view, as pleasing to the man of taste as to the friend of humanity. "It is to be regretted," says, with perfect justice, the author of an excellent article in the Quarterly Review,[I] "that these structures are placed so far at sea that they are very little seen, for they are, taken altogether, perhaps the most perfect specimens of modern architecture which exist. Tall and graceful as the minar of an Eastern mosque, they possess far more solidity and beauty of construction; and, in addition to this, their form is as appropriate to the purposes for which it was designed as anything ever done by the Greeks, and consequently meets the requirements of good architecture quite as much as a column of the Parthenon."

[Footnote I: No. 228.]

Covered to the height of fifteen feet at spring tide, and little more than a hundred yards in its extent, the famous Bell Rock, or Inchcape, facing the Frith of Tay at a distance of twelve miles at sea, was as dangerous to the navigation of the eastern coast of Scotland as the Eddystone had been to the entrance of the Channel. To erect a tower on a spot like this was an undertaking of no common boldness, but, fired by Smeaton's example, Mr. Robert Stevenson no less gloriously succeeded in converting what for ages had been a source of danger into a beacon of safety.

[Illustration: Bell Rock Lighthouse.]

On the opposite coast of Scotland, and placed in the same parallel of latitude as Bell Rock, the Skerryvore Reef had a name equally dreaded by the mariner. Situated considerably farther from the mainland than the Bell Rock, it is less entirely submerged, some of its summits rising above the level of high water, though the surf dashes over them; but the extent of foul ground is much greater, and hidden dangers, even in fine weather, beset the intervening passage between its eastern extremity and Tyree, from which island it is distant some eleven miles. In rough weather the sea which rises there is described as one in which no ship could live. This terrible reef, so fatal to many a gallant bark, rendered the erection of a lighthouse most desirable, yet such was the difficulty of the case that although so long ago as 1814 an Act was obtained for a light on Skerryvore, it was not before 1837 that Mr. Alan Stevenson, son of the famous architect of the Bell Rock sea-tower, was authorised to commence the work. That difficulty was not confined to the position and character of the reef itself, as the neighbouring island of Tyree afforded no resource, and all the materials for the building, even the stone itself, had to be transported from distant quarters. At length, all preliminary arrangements being settled, the engineer reached the rock and commenced his work, in June 1838, by erecting a barrack-house upon stilts--a sort of dovecot perched on poles--high out of the water on the reef, close to the proposed site of the lighthouse. The erection of this barrack fully occupied the first summer; and, lest it might be supposed that this was but little work for so long a time, it may be as well to remark that, such was the turbulence of the sea that between August 7 and September 11, it had only been possible to be 165 hours on the rock. Much inconvenience was occasioned by the hard and slippery nature of the volcanic formation of the Skerryvore, to which the action of the sea had given the appearance and the smoothness of a mass of dark-coloured glass, so that the foreman of the masons compared the operation of landing on it to that of climbing up the neck of a bottle. When we consider how often, by how many persons, and under what circumstances of swell and motion, this operation was repeated, we must look upon this feature of the spot as an obstacle of no slight amount.

At length, after much danger and difficulty, the barrack was completed, but the first November storm swept it away and utterly annihilated the work of the season. Iron stancheons had been drawn, broken, and twisted like the wires of a champagne bottle; the smith's iron anvil had been transported eight yards from where it was left; and a stone three-fourths of a ton was lifted out from the bottom of a hole and sent towards the top of the rock.

Mortified, but nothing daunted by this disaster, which gave him a warning of the tremendous power he had to contend with, Mr. Stevenson prepared during the winter for the labours of 1839, which, besides the re-erection of the barrack on an improved plan, chiefly consisted in the levelling or blasting of a flat surface of forty-two feet diameter on the top of the rock from which the lighthouse was to arise. This foundation pit was in itself a work of no small magnitude, as it required for its excavation the labours of 20 men for 217 days, the firing of 296 shots, and the removal into deep water of 2,000 tons of material. The blasting, from the absence of all cover and the impossibility of retiring to a distance farther in any case than thirty feet, and often reduced to twelve, demanded all possible carefulness.

The only precautions available were a skilful appointment of the charge and the covering the mines with mats and coarse netting made of old rope. Every charge was fired by or with the assistance of the architect in person, and no mischief occurred.

The year 1840 had now arrived, and the construction of the lighthouse was about to begin. Quarriers and labourers had been busily employed in cutting blocks of stone in the quarries. Carpenters were diligently engaged in making wooden moulds for each lighthouse block wherewith to gauge its exact mathematical figure. In April, a reinforcement of thirty-seven masons from Aberdeen arrived at Tyree--men expert in the difficult work of dressing granite--and, on April 30, the first visit was made to the rock. To the great joy of all, the barrack constructed in the previous season was found uninjured, though a mass of rock weighing about five tons had been detached from its bed and carried right across the foundation pit by the violence of the waves. In this barrack the architect and his party now took up their quarters, which from the frequent flooding of the apartments with water and from the heavy spray that washed the walls were anything but agreeable. "Once," says the gallant engineer,[J] "we were fourteen days without communication with the shore or the steamer, and during the greater part of that time we saw nothing but white fields of foam as far as the eye could reach; and heard nothing but the whistling of the wind and the thunder of the waves, which was at times so loud as to make it almost impossible to hear anyone speak. Such a scene, with the ruins of the former barrack not twenty yards from us, was calculated to inspire the most desponding anticipations; and I well remember the undefined sense of dread that flashed on my mind, on being awakened one night by a heavy sea which struck the barrack and made my cot swing inwards from the wall, and was immediately followed by a cry of terror from the men in the apartment above me, most of whom, startled by the _sound and the tremor_, sprang from their berths to the floor, impressed with the idea that the whole fabric had been washed into the sea."

[Footnote J: Account of Skerryvore Lighthouse, by Alan Stevenson, Engineer to the Northern Lighthouse Board. Edinburgh, 1848.]

This spell of bad weather, though in summer, well-nigh outlasted their provisions; and when at length they were able to make the signal that a landing would be practicable, scarcely twenty-four hours' stock remained on the rock. The landing of the heavy stones from the lighters was a work of no small difficulty, considering the slippery nature of the rock, and as the loss of one dressed stone would frequently have delayed the whole progress of the building, the anxiety was incessant. On July 4, the building of the tower really commenced. Six courses of masonry carried the building to the height of 8 feet 2 inches before the autumnal gales terminated the work of 1840, and an excellent year's work it was. The saying that "what is well begun is half done" was illustrated here. Next year's work was comparatively easy--so that in 1842 the tower rose to its full height of 138 feet; and the year after the light was shedding its beneficent rays over the thirty miles of watery waste that surround the hidden rocks of Skerryvore.

[Illustration: The Skerryvore Lighthouse.]

Well may we be proud of men like Smeaton and the Stevensons; but, while justly admiring their architectural skill, their perseverance, and their courage, we must not forget to offer the just tribute of our gratitude to the eminent natural philosophers without whose ingenious optical inventions the most splendid sea-towers would be comparatively useless. The Pharus or lighthouse of Alexandria was, probably with justice, reckoned among the seven wonders of the world, and its several stories, rising on marble columns to the height of 400 feet, must have presented an imposing spectacle, but I strongly suspect that the rude brazier on the summit of the majestic pile bore the same proportion to the lighthouse lanterns of our time as the wretched coasting-craft of the ancient Greeks to the ocean steamers of the present day. Among the names of those who have contributed most effectually to the progress of marine illumination Argand, Borda, and Fresnel are conspicuous. The hollow cylindrical wick of the first was a sudden and immense advance in the art of economical and effective illumination. The second, by his invention of the parabolic mirror, multiplied the effect of the unassisted flame by 450, and the refracting lens of Fresnel so admirably concentrates the light as to project its warning beams to the wonderful distance of thirty or thirty-five miles.

In former ages the efforts of man to provide a refuge to the mariner from the fury of the raging gale were feeble and insignificant. Content with the harbours that nature had provided, it was then thought quite sufficient to line a river-bank with quays or to enclose a natural pond by walls. The idea of raising colossal breakwaters by casting whole quarries into the deep, or of extending artificial promontories far into the bosom of the ocean, is of modern date, and would have appeared chimerical not only to the ancients but to our fathers not a century ago. The first great work of this description is the famous breakwater planned by De Cessart in 1783, and terminated in 1853, which has converted the open roadstead of Cherbourg into a land-locked harbour. Rising from a depth of 40 feet at low spring tides, on a coast where the floods attain a height of 19 feet, it opposes a front of 12,700 feet to the fury of the storm, and carries 250 pieces of the heaviest cannon on its formidable brow.

It far surpasses in extent and boldness of construction the breakwater at Plymouth, nor will it be eclipsed by the moles now forming at Portland, Holyhead, and Alderney; but although it is a more impressive spectacle to see man struggling with the ocean and producing calmness and shelter in the midst of the raging storm, than to contemplate his operations where he has no such adversaries to subdue, still such buildings as those just described are neither the largest nor the most expensive works required for the accommodation of shipping. Witness the Cyclopean grandeur of the Liverpool docks or of the Great Float at Birkenhead, which alone covers an area of water of 121 acres, and whose portals, with a clear opening of 100 feet, will admit the largest screw-steamer or sailing ship the wildest imagination has yet conceived. Six millions of money is the cost of this one work alone--more than would be required to raise a pyramid like that of Cheops--and even this sum is a trifle when compared with what has been spent on the harbours of Liverpool, London, and other great commercial cities.

Not satisfied with erecting his lighthouses on wave-worn rocks or defying the waves with his colossal breakwaters, man spans bridges over arms of the sea and excavates mines under the abysses of the deep. The locomotive now rolls full speed 100 feet above high water over the strait which separates Anglesea from the mainland; and in Botallack and several other Cornish mines the workman, while resting from his subterranean labours, hears the awful voice of the ocean rolling over his head.

"In all these submarine mines," says Mr. Henwood, "I have heard the dashing of the billows and the grating of the shingle when in calm weather. I was once, however, underground in Wheal Cock during a storm. At the extremity of the level seaward some eighty or one hundred fathoms from the shore, little could be heard of its effects, except at intervals, when the reflux of some unusually large wave projected a pebble outward, bounding and rolling over the rocky bottom. But when standing beneath the base of the cliff, and in that part of the mine where but nine feet of rock stood between us and the ocean, the heavy roll of the large boulders, the ceaseless grinding of the pebbles, the fierce thundering of the billows, with the crackling and boiling as they rebounded, placed a tempest in its most appalling form too vividly before me ever to be forgotten. More than once doubting the protection of our rocky shield, we retreated in affright, and it was only after repeated trials that we had confidence to pursue our investigations." Yet the miners, accustomed from their early youth to the fierce and threatening roaring of the stormy sea, pursue their work from year to year, never doubting that the thin roof which separates them from a watery grave will continue to protect them, as it has shielded their fathers before them.

## PART II.

THE INHABITANTS OF THE SEA.

CHAP. VIII.

THE CETACEANS.

General Remarks on the Organisation of the Cetaceans.--The Large Greenland Whale.--His Food and Enemies.--The Fin-Back or Rorqual.--The Antarctic Whale.--The Sperm-Whale.--The Unicorn Fish.--The Dolphin.--Truth and Fable.--The Porpoise.--The Grampus.--History of the Whale Fishery.

Of all the living creatures that people the immensity of ocean, the cetaceans, or the whale family, are the most perfect. Their anatomical construction renders them in many respects similar to man, and their heart is susceptible of a warmth of feeling unknown to the cold-blooded fishes; for the mother shows signs of attachment to her young, and forgets her own safety when some danger menaces her offspring. Like man, the cetaceans breathe through lungs, and possess a double heart, receiving and propelling streams of _warm_ red blood. The anatomical structure of their pectoral fins bears great resemblance to that of the human arm, as the bony structure of those organs equally consists of a shoulder-blade, an upper arm, a radius and ulna, and five fingers.

But the arm, which in man moves freely, is here chained to the body as far as the hand, and the latter, which, in obedience to human volition and intellect, executes such miracles of industry and art, is here covered with a thick skin, and appears as a broad undivided fin or flapper. Yet still it is destined for higher service than that of a mere propelling oar, as it serves the mother to guide and shield her young. The lower extremities are of course wanting, but their functions are performed by the mighty _horizontal_ tail, by whose powerful strokes the unwieldy animal glides rapidly through the waters.

The cetaceans distinguish themselves, moreover, from the fishes by the bringing forth of living young, by a greater quantity of blood, by the smoothness of their skin, under which is found a thick layer of fat, and by their simple or double blow-hole, which is situated at the top of the head, and corresponds to the nostrils of the quadrupeds, though not for the purpose of smelling, but merely as an organ of respiration.

[Illustration: Bones of the Anterior Fin of a Whale.]

Our knowledge of the cetaceans is still very incomplete; and this is not to be wondered at, when we consider that they chiefly dwell in the most inaccessible parts of the ocean, and that when met with, the swiftness of their movements rarely allows more than a flighty view of their external form. Thus their habits and mode of living are mostly enveloped in obscurity; and while doubtless many cetaceans are to the present day unknown, one and the same species has not seldom been described under different names, to the no small confusion of the naturalist.

The cetaceans are either without a dental apparatus, or provided with teeth. The former, or the whalebone whales, have two blow-holes on the top of the head, in the form of two longitudinal fissures; while in the latter, (sperm-whales, unicorn-fish, dolphins,) which comprise by far the greater number of species, there is but one transversal spout-hole. In all whales the larynx is continued to the spouting canal, and deeply inserted or closely imbricated within its tube. Thus no tones approaching to a voice can be emitted except through the spiracles, which are encumbered with valves, and evidently badly adapted for the transmission of sound. Scoresby assures us that the Greenland whale has no voice, and Bennett frequently noticed sperm-whales suffering from extreme alarm and injury, but never heard any sound from them beyond that attending an ordinary respiration.

The whalebone whales are either _smooth-backs_ (Balænæ), or _fin-backs_ (Balænopteræ), having a vertical fin rising from the lower part of the back. To the former belongs the mighty Greenland Whale (_Balæna mysticetus_), the most bulky of living animals, and of all cetaceans the most useful and important to man. Its greatest length, according to Scoresby, is from sixty to seventy feet, and round the thickest part of its body it measures from thirty to forty feet, but the incessant persecutions to which it is subjected scarcely ever allow it to attain its full growth.

The whale being somewhat lighter than the medium in which it swims, its weight may be ascertained with tolerable accuracy; and Scoresby tells us that a stout animal of sixty feet weighs about seventy tons, allowing thirty to the blubber, eight or ten to the bones, and thirty or thirty-two to the carcase. The lightness of the whale, which enables it to keep its _crown_, in which the blow-hole is situated, and a considerable extent of back above the water, without any effort or motion, is not only owing to its prodigious case of fat, but also to the lightness of its bones, most of which are very porous and contain large quantities of fine oil; an admirable provision of nature for the wants of a creature destined to breathe the atmospheric air, and to skim its food from the surface of the waters.

The unsightly animal shows disproportion in all its organs. While the tail fin measures twenty-four feet across, the pectoral fins or paddles are no more than six feet long. The monstrous head forms about the third of the whole body, and is furnished with an equally monstrous mouth, which on opening exhibits a cavity about the size of an ordinary ship's cabin. The leviathans of the dry land, the elephant, the rhinoceros, and the hippopotamus, are provided with tusks and teeth corresponding to their size--huge weapons fit for eradicating trees or crushing the bone-harnessed crocodile; but the masticatory implements of the giant of the seas are scarcely capable of dividing the smallest food. Instead of teeth, its enormous upper jaw is beset with about 500 laminæ of whalebone, ranged side by side, two-thirds of an inch apart, the thickness of blade included, and resembling a frame of saws in a saw-mill. Their interior edges are covered with fringes of hair; externally they are curved and flattened down, so as to present a smooth surface to the lips. The largest laminæ, situated on both sides of the jaw, attain a length of fifteen feet, and measure from twelve to fifteen inches at their base; in front and towards the back of the mouth they are much shorter.

[Illustration: Skull of Whale, with the Baleen.]

Besides these, there are suspended from the palate many other small laminæ of the thickness of a quill, a few inches long, and likewise terminating in a fringe. Thus the whole roof of the mouth resembles a shaggy fur, under which lies the soft and spongy tongue, a monstrous mass often ten feet broad and eighteen feet long.

[Illustration: Clio borealis.]

This whole formation is beautifully adapted to the peculiar nourishment of the whale, which does not consist, as one might suppose, of the larger fishes, but of the minute animals, (_Medusæ_, _Entomostraca_, _Clio borealis_, and other pteropod molluscs,) with which its pasture-grounds in the northern seas abound. To gather food, it swims rapidly with open mouth over the surface; and on closing the wide gates, and expelling the foaming streams, the little creatures remain entangled by thousands in the fringy thicket as in a net; there to be crushed and bruised by the tongue into a savoury pulp. Fancy the vast numbers requisite to keep a monster of seventy tons in good condition.

The back of the whale is usually of a fine glossy black, marked with whitish rays, which have some resemblance to the veins of wood. This mixture of colours presents an agreeable appearance, especially when the back of the fish is illuminated with the rays of the sun. The under part of the trunk and of the lower jaw is of a dead white. The skin is about an inch thick, and covers a layer of fat of fifteen inches; a most excellent coat for keeping the whale warm and increasing its buoyancy, but at the same time the chief cause which induces man to pursue it with the deadly harpoon.

The usual march of the whale over the waters is rarely more than four miles an hour, but its speed increases to an astonishing rapidity when terror or the agonies of pain drive it madly through the sea.

In its sportive humours it is sometimes seen to spring out of the water, and to remain suspended for a moment in the air. On falling back again into the sea, high foam-crested fountains spout forth on all sides, and mighty waves propagate the tumult in widening circles over the troubled ocean. Or else it raises its bulky head vertically on high, so that the deceived mariner fancies he sees some black rock looming out of the distant waters. But suddenly the fancied cliff turns round and brandishes playfully its enormous flukes in the air, or lashes the waters with such prodigious power, that the sound rolls far away like thunder over the deserts of the ocean.

Strange to say, the giant is of so cowardly a nature, that the sight of a sea-bird often fills him with the greatest terror, and causes him to avoid the imaginary danger by a sudden plunge into the deep.

Besides man, a vast number of enemies, great and small, persecute the whale and embitter his life.

The Sword-fish (_Xiphias Gladius_) and the Thresher or Sea-fox, a species of shark (_Carcharias Vulpes_), often attack him conjointly and in packs. As soon as his back appears above the water, the threshers, springing several yards into the air, descend with great violence upon the object of their rancour, and inflict upon him the most severe slaps with their long tails, the sound of which resembles the report of distant musketry. The sword-fish, in their turn, attack the distressed whale, stabbing from below; and thus beset on all sides, and bleeding from countless wounds, the huge animal, though dealing the most dreadful blows with its enormous tail, and lashing the crimsoned waters into foam, is obliged to succumb at last.

The Greenland Shark (_Squalus borealis_) is also one of the bitterest enemies of the whale, biting and annoying it while living, and feeding on it when dead. It scoops hemispherical pieces out of its body nearly as big as a man's head, and continues scooping and gorging lump after lump, until the whole cavity of its belly is filled. It is so insensible of pain, that, though it has been run through the body, and escaped, yet after a while Scoresby has seen it return to banquet again on the whale at the very spot where it received its wounds. The heart, as is frequently the case with gluttons, bears no proportion to its vast capacity of stomach; for it is very small, and performs only six or eight pulsations in a minute, continuing its beating for some hours after having been taken out of the body. The body also, though separated into any number of parts, gives evidence of life for a similar length of time. It is therefore so difficult to kill, that it is actually unsafe to trust the hand in its mouth though the head be separated from the body.

Strange to say, though the whale-fishers frequently slip into the water where sharks abound, Scoresby never heard an instance of their having been attacked by one of these voracious monsters. Perhaps they are loth to attack man, looking upon him as their best purveyor.

[Illustration: Saw of the Saw-fish.]

Fishermen relate that the whale and saw-fish, whenever they come together, engage in deadly combat; the latter invariably making the attack with inconceivable fury.

"The meeting of these champions proud Seems like the bursting thunder cloud."

The whale, whose only defence is his tail, endeavours to strike his enemy with it; and a single blow would prove mortal. But the saw-fish, with astonishing agility, shuns the tremendous stroke, bounds into the air, and returns upon his huge adversary, plunging the rugged weapon with which he is furnished into his back. The whale is still more irritated by this wound, which only becomes fatal when it penetrates the fat; and thus pursuing and pursued, striking and stabbing, the engagement only ends with the death of one of the unwieldy combatants.

Even the white-bear is said to attack the whale, watching his approach to the sea-shore; but the enmity of the narwhal is evidently fabulous, as both cetaceans may frequently be seen together in perfect harmony.

Besides these formidable attacks of what may be considered as more or less noble foes, the whale is constantly harassed by the bites of the vilest insects. A large species of louse adheres by thousands to its back, and gnaws this animated pasture-ground, so as to cover it frequently with one vast sore. In the summer, when this plague is greatest, numbers of aquatic birds accompany the whale, and settle on his back, as soon as it appears above the water, in order to feed upon these disgusting parasites.

[Illustration: Whale Louse.]

Barnacles often cover the whale in such masses, that his black skin disappears under a whitish mantle, and even sea-weeds attach themselves to his vast jaws, floating like a beard, and reminding one of Birnam's wandering forest.

As its name testifies, the home of the Greenland whale is confined to the high northern seas, where it has been met with in the open waters or along every ice-bound shore as far as man has penetrated towards the Pole. The southern limit of its excursions seems to be about 60° N. lat. It never visits the North Sea, and is seldom found within 200 miles of the British coasts. Its favourite resorts are the so-called whale-grounds,[K] between 74° and 80° N. lat., where the warmth, imparted to the water by the Gulf-stream, favours the multiplication of the small marine animals which form the nourishment of the Leviathan of the seas.

[Footnote K: See page 20.]

Sometimes open spaces in the ice, abounding in minute crustaceans and medusæ, attract a larger number of whales, but the huge creature cannot be said to live in larger herds or associations.

The Fin-fish or northern Rorqual (_Balænoptera boops_, _musculus_) attains a greater length than the sleek-backed Greenland whale, but does not equal it in bulk, having a more elongated form and a more tapering head. Its whalebone is much shorter and coarser, being adapted to a different kind of food, for, despising the minute medusæ and crustaceans which form the food of its huge relation, the more nimble rorqual pursues the herring and the mackerel on their wandering path. Like the blubber-whale, the fin-back is black above, white below, but distinguishes itself by long and numerous blood-red streaks or furrows, running under the lower jaw and breast as far as the middle of the belly. This is the species of whale which not unfrequently strands on our shores, for though an inhabitant of the Arctic seas, it wanders farther to the south than the Greenland whale. It is seldom harpooned, for the produce of oil is not equivalent to the expense, the risk, and the danger attending its capture.

In the southern hemisphere, the Antarctic Smooth-backed Whale (_B. antarctica_), a species similar to the Greenland whale, though of less bulk, is the chief object of the fisherman's pursuit. It hangs much about the coasts in the temperate latitudes, and loves the neighbouring seas, where the discoloured waters afford the richest repasts, but is not known in the central parts of the Pacific. In the spring it resorts to the bays on the coasts of Chili, South Africa, the Brazils, Australia, New Zealand, Van Diemen's Land, &c. &c., where it is attacked either by stationary fishermen, or by whalers, who at that time leave the high seas.

Farther towards the pole _Hump-backs_ and _Fin-backs_ abound; but these are far from equalling the former in value. When Dumont d'Urville, returning from his expedition to the south pole, told the whalers whom he found in the Bay of Talcahuano of the great number of cetaceans he had seen in the higher latitudes, their eyes glistened at the pleasing prospect; but when he added that they were only hump-backs and fin-backs, they did not conceal their disappointment; for the hump-back is meagre, and not worth the boiling, and the fin-back dives with such rapidity, that he snaps the harpoon line, or drags the boat along with him into the water.

The Sperm-Whale, or Cachalot (_Physeter macrocephalus_), rivals the great smooth-backed whales both in its various utility to man and the colossal dimensions of its unwieldy body. The largest authentically recorded size of the uncouth animal is seventy-six feet by thirty-eight in girth; but whalers are well contented to consider fifty-five or sixty feet the average length of the largest examples they commonly obtain. The male, however, alone attains these ample proportions; the adult female does not exceed thirty or at most thirty-five feet, so that there is a greater disproportion of size between sexes than in any other known species of cetaceans.

The form of the beast is without symmetry, and from the general absence of other prominent organs than the tail or pectoral fins, can be compared to little else than a dark rock or the bole of some giant tree. The prevailing colour is a dull black, occasionally marked with white, especially on the abdomen and tail. The summit of the head and trunk presents a plane surface, until about the posterior third of the back, whence arises a hump or spurious fin of pyramidal form, and entirely composed of fat. From this embossed appendage an undulating series of six or eight similar, but smaller elevations, occupies the upper margin or ridge of the tail to the commencement of the caudal fin. The pectoral fins or paddles are placed a short distance behind the head; they are triangular in shape, diminutive as compared with the size of the whale, and being connected to the trunk by a ball and socket joint, possess free movement, either vertical or horizontal.

[Illustration: Cuttle-fish (Sepia).]

Owing to the flexibility of the tail, the movements of the tail-fin, or "flukes," which sometimes measures eighteen feet across, are exceedingly extensive, whilst its power may be estimated by the gigantic bundles of round tendons, which pass on either side the loins, to be inserted into its base. Whether wielded in sportive mood or in anger, its action is marked by rapidity and ease, and when struck forcibly on the surface of the ocean, produces a report which may be heard at a considerable distance. In progression, the action of this organ is precisely the reverse of that of the tail of the lobster, for whilst the latter animal swims backward by striking the water with its tail from behind forwards, the cachalot and other cetaceans swim forward by striking with their flukes in the contrary direction, the fin being brought beneath the body by an oblique and unresisting movement; while the act of springing it back and straightening the tail propels the animal ahead with an undulating or leaping gait. When employed offensively the tail is curved in a direction contrary to that of the object aimed at, and the blow is inflicted by the force of the recoil. The lower jaw appears diminutive, slender, and not unlike the lower mandible of a bird. When the mouth is closed it is received within the soft parts pendent from the border of the upper jaw, and is nearly concealed by them. True and serviceable teeth are situated only in the lower jaw, and are received into corresponding sockets in the upper jaw. In aged males they are of great solidity and size, attaining a weight of from two to four pounds each; their entire structure is ivory. This powerful armament shows us at once that the food of the cachalot must be very different from that of the whalebone cetaceans; it generally consists of cuttle-fish, many kinds of which are ejected from its stomach when it is attacked by the boats, as well as after death. Owing to the great projection of the snout beyond the lower jaw, it may be requisite for this whale to turn on its side or back to seize its more bulky prey; a supposition strengthened by the fact that, when the animal attacks a boat with its mouth, it invariably assumes a reversed posture, carrying the lower jaw above the object it is attempting to bite. As long as it continues on the surface of the sea, the cachalot casts from its nostril a constant succession of spouts, at intervals of ten or fifteen seconds. As in all whales, the jets are not, as frequently imagined, water-columns, but a thick white mist ejected by one continual effort to the height of six or eight feet, and rushing forth with a sound resembling a moderate surf upon a smooth beach. The peculiar fat or sperm which renders the cachalot so valuable, is chiefly situated in the head. _Junk_ is the name given by the fishermen to a solid mass of soft, yellow, and oily fat, weighing between two and three tons, based on the upper jaw, and forming the front and lower part of the snout; while the cavity called _case_ is situated beneath and to the right of the spouting canal, and corresponds to nearly the entire length of that tube. It is filled with a very delicate web of cellular tissue, containing in large cells a limpid and oily fluid, which is liberated by the slightest force. The quantity, chiefly spermaceti, contained in this singular receptacle, is often very considerable, nearly 500 gallons having been obtained from the case of one whale. So vast an accumulation of fat has obviously been intended to insure a correct position in swimming, to facilitate the elevation of the spiracle above the surface of the sea, and to counteract the weight of the bony and other ponderous textures of the head; objects which in the Greenland whale are sufficiently attained by a similar accumulation of fat in the lips and tongue, and by the more elevated situation of the spout-hole.

While the large whalebone whales generally roam about in solitary couples, the cachalot forms large societies. _Schools_, consisting of from twenty to fifty individuals, are composed of females attended by their young, and associated with at least one adult male of the largest size, who generally takes a defensive position in the rear when the school is flying from danger.

_Pods_ are smaller congregations of young or half-grown males, which have been driven from the maternal schools. Two or more schools occasionally coalesce to a "_body of whales_," so that Bennett[L] sometimes saw the ocean for several miles around the ship swarming with sperm leviathans, and strewn with a constant succession of spouts. These large assemblies sometimes proceed at a rapid pace in one determinate direction, and are then soon lost sight of; at other times they bask and sleep upon the surface, spouting leisurely, and exhibiting every indication of being _at home_, or on their feeding ground. Like most gregarious animals, the cachalots are naturally timid. A shoal of dolphins leaping in their vicinity is sufficient to put a whole school to flight: yet occasionally fighting individuals are met with; particularly among those morose solitary animals that most likely from their intolerable character have been turned out of the society of their kind. The central deserts of ocean, or the neighbourhood of the steepest coasts, are the chief resort of the cachalot; and so great is the difference of his _habitat_ from that of the smooth-backed whales, that during the whole time Bennett was cruising in quest of cachalots, he in no single instance saw an example of the true whale. The cachalot is more especially found on the _line-currents_, which extend from the equator to about the seventh degree of north and south latitudes, yet it has been noticed in the Mediterranean, and one individual, a stray sheep indeed, has even been captured in the Thames.

[Footnote L: Narrative of a Whaling Voyage round the Globe.]

The Narwal, or Unicorn-fish, attains a length of from twenty to twenty-five feet. He is of a grey-white colour, punctured with many white spots, and as his head is not disproportionate to the length of his body, may rank among the handsomest cetaceans. He distinguishes himself, as is well known, from all other members of the family by the long twisted tooth or horn projecting horizontally from the upper jaw. This mighty weapon, the true use of which has not yet been fully ascertained, was formerly sold at a very high price, as proceeding from the fabulous unicorn; at present, it is only paid according to the worth of its excellent ivory, which is harder, heavier, and less liable to turn yellow than that of the elephant. The whalers are therefore highly delighted when they can pick up a chance narwal, but this only succeeds in narrow bays; for the unicorn-fish is an excellent swimmer, and extremely watchful. In spite of his menacing appearance, he is a harmless sociable creature, fond of gambolling and crossing swords playfully with his compeers. It is remarkable that the opening of the mouth of so huge an animal is scarcely large enough to admit the hand of a man. Scoresby found in the stomach of a narwal remains of cuttle fishes, which seem to form his chief aliment, besides pieces of skates and plaice. The narwal is frequent about Davis' Straits and Disco Bay, but is nowhere found in the Pacific, having most likely not yet discovered the north-western passage. He rarely wanders into the temperate seas, yet one was caught, in 1800, near Boston in Lincolnshire, and two others, in 1736, on the German coast of the North Sea.

The Dolphin tribe is distinguished from the cachalot by a more proportionate head; from the narwal by the absence of the long horn; and generally possesses sharp teeth in both jaws, all of one form. The number of species is very great; Linnæus distinguished four sperm-whales and three dolphins; now many naturalists acknowledge but one species of the former, while the dolphins have increased to more than thirty, and many are as yet unknown.

[Illustration: Delphinus Delphis.]

The most famous member of this numerous family is undoubtedly the classical Dolphin of the ancients (_Delphinus delphis_) which attains a length of from nine to ten feet, and is, according to Pliny, the swiftest of all animals, so as to merit the appellation of the "arrow of the sea." His lively troops often accompany for days the track of a ship, and agreeably interrupt the monotony of a long sea-voyage. As if in mockery of the most rapid sailer, they shoot past so as to vanish from the eye, and then return again with the same lightning-like velocity. Their spirits are so brisk that they frequently leap into the air, as if longing to expatiate in a lighter fluid. Hence, dolphins are the favourites of the mariner and the poet, who have vied in embellishing their history with the charms of fiction.

Everybody knows the wonderful story of Arion, who having been forced by pirates to leap into the sea, proceeded merrily to his journey's end on the back of a dolphin:--

"Secure he sits, and with harmonious strains Requites his bearer for his friendly pains. The gods approve, the dolphin heaven adorns, And with nine stars a constellation forms."

Pliny relates the no less astonishing tale of a boy at Baiæ, who by feeding it with bread, gained the affections of a dolphin, so that the thankful creature used to convey him every morning to school across the sea to Puteoli, and back again. When the boy died, the poor disconsolate dolphin returned every morning to the spot where he had been accustomed to meet his friend, and soon fell a victim to his grief. The same naturalist tells us also that the dolphins at Narbonne rendered themselves very useful to the fishermen by driving the fish into their nets, and were generously rewarded for their assistance with "bread soaked in wine." A king of Caria having chained a dolphin in the harbour, its afflicted associates appeared in great numbers, testifying their anxiety for its deliverance by such unequivocal signs of sorrow, that the king, touched with compassion, restored the prisoner to liberty.

Such, and similar fables, which were believed by the naturalists of antiquity, are laughed at even by the old women of our times. The dolphin is in no respects superior to the other cetaceans; his musical taste is as low as zero, and if, like the bonito and albacore, he follows a ship for days together, it is most surely not out of affection for man, but on account of the offal that is thrown overboard. But do not many human friendships repose on similar selfish motives?

[Illustration: The Porpoise.]

The Porpoise (_Delphinus Phocœna_), which only attains a length of five or six feet, and seems to be the smallest of all cetaceans, is frequently confounded with the dolphin. It is at home in the whole Northern Atlantic, in the Mediterranean, and the Euxine. While the dolphin prefers the high sea, the porpoise loves tranquil bays and cliff-sheltered shores, and often swims up the rivers, so that individuals have been caught in the Elbe and Seine as high up as Dessau and Paris. The porpoise is a no less excellent swimmer than the dolphin, making at least fifteen miles an hour. His rapidity and sharp teeth render him a most dangerous enemy to all the lesser fry of the ocean, whose sole refuge lies in the shallowest waters. When he rises to the surface to draw breath, the back only appears, the head and tail are kept under water. At the entrance of harbours, where he is frequently seen gambolling, his undulatory or leaping movements, now rising with a grunt, now sinking to reappear again at some distance, afford an entertaining spectacle.

A much more formidable animal, the largest of the whole dolphin tribe, is the ravenous Grampus, (_Delphinus Orca_,) which measures no less than twenty-five feet in length, and twelve or thirteen in girth. The upper part of the body is black, the lower white: the dorsal fin rises in the shape of a cone, to the height of three feet or more.

All naturalists agree in describing the grampus as the most voracious of the dolphin family. Its ordinary food is the seal and some species of flat-fish, but it also frequently gives chase to the porpoise, and perhaps the whale would consider the grampus as his most formidable enemy, were it not for the persecutions of man. Pliny gives us a fine description of the conflicts which arise between these monsters of the deep. At the time when the whale resorts to the bays to cast its young, it is attacked by the grampus, who either lacerates it with his dreadful jaws, or in rapid onset endeavours to strike in its ribs, as with a catapult. The terrified whale knows no other way to escape from these furious attacks, than by interposing a whole sea between him and his enemy. But the grampus, equally wary and active, cuts off his retreat, and drives the whale into narrower and narrower waters, forcing him to bruise himself on the sharp rocks, or to strand upon the shelving sands, nor ceases his efforts until he has gained a complete victory. During this fight the sea seems to rage against itself, for though no wind may be stirring the surface, waves, such as no storm creates, rise under the strokes of the infuriated combatants.

While the Emperor Claudius was visiting the harbour of Ostium, a grampus stranded in the shallow waters. The back appeared above the surface of the sea, and resembled a ship with its keel turned upwards. The Emperor caused nets to be stretched across the mouth of the harbour to prevent the animal's escape, and then attacked it in person with his prætorian guards. The soldiers surrounding the monster in boats, and hurling their inglorious spears, exhibited an amusing spectacle to the populace.

* * * * *

That man ventures to pursue the leviathans of the deep among the fogs and icebergs of the Arctic seas, and is generally successful in their capture, may surely be considered as one of the proudest triumphs of his courage and his skill.

The breast of the first navigator, says Horace, was cased with triple steel; but of what adamantine materials must that man's heart have been formed, whose steadfast hand hurled the first harpoon against the colossal whale?

History has not preserved his name; like the great warriors that lived before Agamemnon, he sank into an obscure grave for want of a Homer to celebrate his exploits. We only know that the Biscayans were the first _civilised_ people that in the fourteenth and fifteenth century fitted out ships for the whale fishery. At first the bold men of Bayonne and Santander contented themselves with pursuing their prey, (most likely rorquals) in the neighbouring seas, but as the persecuted whales diminished in frequency, they followed them farther to the north, until they came to the haunts of the real whale, whose greater abundance of fat rewarded their intrepidity with a richer spoil.

Their success naturally roused the emulation and avidity of other seafaring nations, and thus, towards the end of the sixteenth century, we see the English, and soon after the Dutch, enter the lists as their competitors. At first our countrymen were obliged to send to "Biskaie for men skilful in catching the whale, and ordering of the oil, and one cooper, skilful to set up the staved casks," (Hakluyt's _Voyages_, i. 414); but soon, by their skill, their industry and perseverance, together with the aid and encouragement granted by the legislature, they learnt to carry on the whale fishery on more advantageous terms than the original adventurers, whose efforts became less enterprising as their success was more precarious.

The first attempts of the English date as far back as the year 1594, when some ships were sent out to Cape Breton for morse and whale fishing. The fishing proved unsuccessful, but they found in an island 800 whale fins or whalebone, part of the cargo of a Biscayan ship wrecked there three years before, which they put on board and brought home. This was the first time this substance was imported into England.

Hull took the lead in the Greenland whale fishery in 1598, thirteen years after the first company for that purpose had been formed in Amsterdam, and as both maritime nations gave it every encouragement, not only on account of its profits, but also from considering it as one of the best nurseries for their seamen, it gradually grew to a very important branch of business. Some idea may be formed of the extent to which the Dutch engaged in the whale fishery during the last century, by stating that for a period of forty-six years preceding 1722, 5886 ships were employed in it, and captured 32,907 whales.

In the year 1788, 222 English vessels were employed in the northern fishery.

The earliest period at which we find the pursuit of the sperm-whale conducted upon a scientific plan is about 1690, when it was commenced by the American colonists. In 1775, ships were first sent out from ports of Great Britain, but for some years it was necessary to appoint an American commander and harpooner until competent officers could be reared. At the same early date the sperm fishery was chiefly prosecuted in the Atlantic, but Messrs. Enderby's ship "Emilia" having rounded Cape Horn in 1788, first carried the sperm-whale fishery into the Pacific, where its success opened a wide and fruitful field for future exertions. As our whalers became better acquainted with the South Sea, many valuable resorts were discovered. In 1819 the "Syren" (British) first carried on the fishery in the western parts of that great ocean, and in the year 1848 the American whaler "Superior," Captain Roys, penetrated through Behring's Straits into the Icy Sea, and opened the fishery in those remote waters. The year after no less than 154 vessels followed upon his track, and the number has been increasing ever since. At present the Americans are the people which carries on the whale fishery with the greatest energy and good fortune. While of late years only thirty or forty British sail have been employed in the Pacific, our cousins "across the Atlantic" numbered in the year 1841 no less than 650 whalers, manned by 13,500 seamen. One of the causes of their success may be, that while the whale fishery in England is carried on by men of large capital, who are the sole proprietors of the ship, the American interest in one vessel is held by many men of small capital, and not unfrequently by the commander and officers. It must, however, not be forgotten that the Australian colonies, being more conveniently situated than the mother country, fit out many ships for the whale fishery, which is besides conducted in several permanent stations along the coasts of New Zealand, &c.

Whale charts have of late years been drawn, on which the best fishing grounds at different seasons are delineated. These maps are not only useful guides for the fishermen, but promise the future solution of the still undecided question of the migration of whales. While some naturalists are of opinion that the cetaceans, flying from the pursuit of man, abandon their old haunts for more sequestered regions, others, like M. Jacquinot (_Zoologie, Voyage de l'Astrolabe et de la Zèlée_) believe that if the whaler is continually obliged to look out for more productive seas, it is not because the whale has migrated, but because he has been nearly extirpated in one place and left unmolested in another.

The Greenland whale fishery was for more than a hundred years confined to the seas between Spitzbergen and Greenland; the entrance and east shore of Davis' Straits not being frequented before the beginning of the last century. Since then the expeditions of Ross and Parry have made the whalers acquainted with a number of admirable stations on the farther side of Davis' Straits and in the higher latitudes of Baffin's Bay. The vessels destined for that quarter sail usually in March, though some delay their departure till the middle or even the end of April. They proceed first to the northern parts of the coast of Labrador, or to the mouth of Cumberland Strait, carrying on what is called the south-west fishery. After remaining there till about the beginning of May, they cross to the eastern shore of the strait and fish upwards along the coast, particularly in South-east Bay, North-east Bay, Kingston Bay, or Horn Sound.

About the month of July they usually cross Baffin's Bay to Lancaster Sound, which they sometimes enter, and occasionally even ascend Barrow's Strait twenty or thirty miles. In returning, they fish down the western shore, where their favourite stations are Pond's Bay, Agnes' Monument, Home Bay, and Cape Searle, and sometimes persevere till late in October. The casualties are generally very great, the middle of Baffin's Bay being filled with a compact and continuous barrier, through which, till a very advanced period of the season, it is impossible for the navigator to penetrate. Between this central body and that attached to the land, there intervenes a narrow and precarious passage, where many a vessel has been crushed or pressed out of the water and laid upon the ice. In 1819 ten ships were lost out of sixty-three, and in 1821 eleven out of seventy-nine. Fortunately the loss of lives is seldom to be deplored, as the weather is generally calm and the crew has time enough to escape in another vessel.

Whale fishing is not only a very dangerous and laborious pursuit, it is also extremely precarious and uncertain in its results. Sometimes a complete cargo of oil and whalebone is captured in a short time, but it also happens that after a long cruise not a single fish is caught--a result equally unfortunate for the ship owner and the crew, who look to a share of the profits for their pay.

How much the whale fishery depends upon chance is shown by the following facts. In the year 1718 the Dutch Greenland fleet, consisting of 108 ships, captured 1291 fish, worth at least 650,000_l._, while in the year 1710, 137 ships took no more than 62. Various meteorological circumstances--the prevalence of particular winds, the character of the summer or preceding winter--are probably the causes of the extraordinary failure and success of the fishery in different years. The Pacific is as fallacious as the Arctic seas. Thus Dumont d'Urville met in the Bay of Talcahuano with several whalers, one of whom had rapidly filled half his ship, while the others had cruised more than a year without having harpooned a single fish. In such cases the captains have the greatest trouble in preventing their men from deserting, who, being disappointed in their hopes, naturally enough look out for a better chance elsewhere.

The method of whale catching has been so often and so minutely described, that it is doubtless familiar to the reader. As soon as a whale is in sight, boats are got out with all speed, and row or sail as silently and quietly as possible towards the monster. One of the crew--the man of unflinching eye and nervous arm--stands upright, harpoon in hand, ready to hurl the murderous spear into the animal's side, as soon as the proper moment shall have come. When struck the whale dives down perpendicularly with fearful velocity, or goes off horizontally with lightning speed, at a short distance from the surface, dragging after him the line to which the barbed instrument of his agony is fixed. But soon the necessity of respiration forces him to rise again above the waters, when a second harpoon, followed by a third or fourth at every reappearance, plunges into his flank. Maddened with pain and terror, he lashes the crimsoned waters into foam, but all his efforts to cast off the darts that lacerate his flesh are vain, and his gaping wounds, though not "as deep as wells, nor as wide as church-doors," are still large enough to let out sufficient blood even to exhaust a whale. His movements become more and more languid and slow, his gasping and snorting more and more oppressed, a few convulsive heavings agitate the mighty mass, and then it floats inert and lifeless on the waters. As soon as death is certain--for to the last moment a convulsive blow of the mighty tail might dash the overhasty boat to pieces--the whale is lashed by chains to the vessel's side, stripped of his valuable fat, and then left to float, a worthless carcase, on the heaving ocean.

And now, man having taken his share, there begins a magnificent feast for birds and fishes. Crowds of fulmars, snow birds, or kittiwakes, flock together from all sides to enjoy the delicious repast; but their delight, so rare is perfect felicity on earth, is but too often disturbed by their terrible rival the blue gull (_Larus glaucus_), which, while it rivals them in rapacity, surpasses them all in strength, and forces them to disgorge the daintiest morsels. Meanwhile sharks, saw-fishes, and whatever else possesses sharp teeth and boldness enough to mix among such formidable company, are busy biting, hacking, scooping, and cutting below the water line, so that in a short time, notwithstanding its vast bulk, the carrion disappears.

The catching of the whale does not always end so fortunately as I have just described. Sometimes the line becomes entangled, and drags the boat into the abyss; or the tail of the animal, sweeping rapidly through the air, either descends upon the shallop, cutting it down to the water's edge, or encounters in its course some of the crew standing up (such as the headsman or harpooner), who are carried away and destroyed. Thus Mr. Young, chief mate of the "Tuscan," was seen flying through the air at a considerable height, and to the distance of nearly forty yards from the boat, ere he fell into the water, where he remained floating motionless on the surface for a few moments, and then sank and was seen no more.

Sometimes, particularly among the sperm-whales, desperate characters are found, that without waiting for the attack, rush furiously against the boats sent out against them, and seem to love fighting for its own sake. Bennett describes an encounter of this kind which he witnessed in the South Sea. The first effort of the whale was to rush against the boat with his head. Having been baffled by the crew steering clear, he next attempted to crush it with his jaws; failing again, through the unaccommodating position of his mouth, he remedied this defect with much sagacity, for approaching impetuously from a distance of forty yards, he turned upon his back, raising his lower jaw to grasp the boat from above. A lance-wound, however, applied in time, caused him to close his mouth; but continuing to advance, he struck the boat with such force that he nearly overturned it, and concluded by again turning on his back and thrusting his lower jaw through the planks. Fortunately the other boats came up to the rescue, and an addition of many tons of sperm to the ship's cargo made up for the damaged boat.

[Illustration: Sperm-Whale.]

Although generally only the greater cetaceans are objects of pursuit at sea, yet man does not disdain the capture of the several dolphin-species when they approach his shores, and surrender themselves as it were into his hands. The intelligence that a shoal of ca'ing whales (_Delphinus melas_) has been seen approaching the coast, operates like an electric shock upon the inhabitants of the Feroë Islands. The whole village, old and young, is instantly in motion, and soon numerous boats push off from shore to surround the unsuspecting herd. Slowly and steadily they are driven into a bay, the phalanx of their enemies draws closer and closer together; terrified by stones and blows, they run ashore, and lie gasping as the flood recedes. Then begins the work of death, amid the loud rejoicings of the happy islanders. The visits of the ca'ing whale are extremely uncertain. From 1754 till 1776 scarce one was caught, but on the 16th of August of the last-named year more than 800 were driven on the strand, and changed dearth into abundance. During the four summer months that Langbye sojourned on the islands in the year 1817, 623 of these large dolphins, mostly from eight to ten yards long, were caught, and served to pay one half of the imported corn. The division of spoil is made in presence of the "_Amtmann_." Each fish is measured, and its size marked on its skin in Roman characters. The largest whale is given to the boat which first discovered the shoal; then others for the poor and clergyman are selected, and the remainder divided, according to stated rules, between the proprietor of the ground and the persons who drove them on shore. The flesh is either eaten fresh, or cut into slices and hung up to dry; whilst the blubber is partly converted into train oil, or salted in casks and barrels. The fat on the sides of the fish, when hung for a week or two, will keep for years, and is used instead of bacon by the natives.

The ca'ing whale, remarkable from following a leader and swimming in large herds, also strands from time to time on the coasts of Iceland and on the Shetland and Orkney Islands, where his appearance is hailed with universal pleasure.

[Illustration: Pelican.]

[Illustration: AUSTRALIAN SEA-BEARS.]

AUSTRALIAN SEA-BEARS.

The group of Australian sea-bears is taken from the "Zoology of the voyage of H.M.S. Erebus and Terror." This animal, _Arctocephalus lobatus_, is among the largest of the Seal family. It is occasionally found congregating in vast numbers upon various portions of the coast of Australia.

CHAP. IX.

SEALS AND WALRUSES.

The Manatees and the Dugongs.--The Seals and the Esquimaux.--King Menelaus in a Seal's Skin.--Barbarous Persecutions of the Seals in Behring's Sea and the Pacific.--Adventures of a Sealer from Geneva.--The Sea Calf.--The Sea Bear.--His Parental Affection.--The Sea Lions.--The Sea Elephant.--The Arctic Walrus.--The Boats of the "Trent" fighting with a Herd of Walruses.--The White Bear.--Touching Example of its Love for its Young.--Chase of the Sea Otter.

The Manatees or Lamantins of the Atlantic Ocean, and the now nearly extinct Dugongs of the Indian seas, form the connecting link between the real whales and the seals and walruses. Like the whales, these animals have no hind feet, and a powerful tail, which is their chief instrument of locomotion; they are distinguishable, however, from them by less fin-like, more flexibly-jointed anterior extremities, on which they lean while cropping the sea-weeds on the shallow shores. When they raise themselves with the front part of their body out of the water, a lively fancy might easily be led to imagine that a human shape, though certainly none of the most beautiful, was surging from the deep. Hence they have been named sea-sirens, mermaids, and mermen, and have given rise to many extravagant fictions. Their intelligence is very obtuse, but their stolid calf-like countenance indicates great mildness of temper.

They live at peace with all other animals, and seem to be solely intent upon satisfying their voracious appetite. Like the hippopotamus, they swallow at once large masses of sea-plants or of juicy grasses growing beyond the water's edge on the borders of rivers.

The Manatees, or Sea-cows, as they are familiarly called, inhabit the coasts and streams of the Atlantic between 19° S. lat. and 25° N. lat., and attain a length of from eight to ten feet. Humboldt compares the flesh to ham, and Von Martius says he never tasted better meat in the Brazils. The South American monks, who have their own ideas on the classification of animals, consider it as fish, and fare sumptuously upon it during Lent. Besides its flesh, one single animal gives as much as 4000 bottles of oil, which is used both in cookery and for lighting. The thick hide is cut into stripes, from which straps or whips are made, to flog the unfortunate negroes. Useful in many respects, defenceless and easy to kill, particularly during the time of the inundations, when it ascends the great rivers, the manatee or sea-cow has been nearly extirpated in many parts where it formerly abounded, a fate which it partakes with the East Indian dugong. These animals might easily be enclosed and tamed, in the lagoons and bays of the tropical streams; but it is to be feared that they will have vanished from the face of the earth before the industry of man endeavours to introduce them, as it were, among the domestic animals.

[Illustration: Skeleton of the Dugong.]

The Seal family forms a still nearer approach to the land quadrupeds, as here hind feet begin to make their appearance. The shortness of these extremities renders their movements upon land generally awkward and slow, but they make up for this deficiency by an uncommon activity in the water. Their body, tapering fish-like from the shoulders to the tail, their abundance of fat, the lightness of which is so favourable to swimming, the position of their feet, admirably formed for rowing, paddling, and steering, their whole economy, in a word, is calculated for the sea. Although citizens of two worlds, their real element is evidently the water, from which their food is exclusively derived.

[Illustration: Female Dugong of Ceylon. (From Sir J. Emerson Tennent's Work on Ceylon.)]

[Illustration: Skeleton of Seal.]

Seals are found in almost all seas, but they particularly abound on the coasts of the colder regions of the earth, and diminish in size and numbers as they approach the torrid zone. Small seals are found near Surinam, but the giants of the family, the huge, sea-elephant, the sea-lion, the sea-bear, belong exclusively to those higher latitudes which the sun visits only with slanting rays, or where the winter forms a dreary and continuous night.

[Illustration: The Seal.]

How wonderful to see the desolate coasts of the icy seas peopled by such herds of great warm-blooded mammalia! But there, where the dry land produces only the scantiest vegetation, the bountiful sea teems with fishes, affording abundance to the hungry seals. The _Merlangus polaris_ and the _Ophidium Parryii_ in the northern hemisphere, as well as the _Nothothenia phocæ_, which Dr. Richardson discovered off Kerguelen's Land, seek in vain to escape from the pursuit of the seals in the hollows and crevices of the pack-ice; and these small fish, in turn, fare sumptuously upon the minute crustaceans and molluscs with which those cold waters abound. Thus animal life, but sparingly diffused over the barren land, luxuriates in the sea, where we find one species preying upon the other, until at last, at the bottom of the scale, we come to creatures so small as to be invisible to the naked eye.

[Illustration: Esquimaux in his Kayak.]

The Greenland Esquimaux, whose ice-bound fatherland affords no food but berries, is also obliged to look to the sea for his subsistence; and the seal plays as important a part in his humble existence as the reindeer among the Laplanders, or the camel among the Bedouins of the desert. Its flesh and fat form his principal food; from its skin he makes his boat, his tent, his dress; from its sinews and bones, his thread and needles, his fishing line, and his bow-strings. Thus on the frozen confines of the Polar Sea, as in many other parts of the world, we find the existence of man almost entirely depending upon that of a single class of animals. But the Bedouin who tends the patient dromedary, or the Laplander who feeds on the flesh and milk of the domesticated reindeer, enjoys an easy life when compared to the Esquimaux, who, to satisfy the cravings of his sharp appetite, is in all seasons obliged to brave all the perils of the Arctic Ocean. Sometimes he waits patiently for hours in the cold fog until a seal rises to the surface, or else he warily approaches a herd basking or sleeping on the ice blocks, for the least noise awakens the watchful animals. Sometimes he has recourse to stratagem, covers himself with a seal skin, and, imitating the movements and gestures of the deceived phocæ, introduces himself into the midst of the unsuspecting troop.

We read in the _Odyssey_ how the "dark-featured hero," Menelaus, deigned to conceal his royal limbs under a fresh seal-skin, in order to surprise Proteus, the infallible seer; and what sufferings his olfactory organs underwent from the

"Unsavoury stench of oil and brackish ooze,"

until the fair sea-nymph Eidothea, whom the gallant chief implored in his distress,

"With nectar'd drops the sickening sense restor'd."

Fortunately for the Esquimaux, his nose is less sensitive than that of the son of Atreus, and without ambrosia, he willingly dons a disguise which affords his unsophisticated taste the pleasure of a theatrical entertainment, combined with the profit of a savoury prize. Physical strength, dexterity, caution, quickness of eye, and acuteness of hearing, are the indispensable qualities of the Esquimaux, and require to be exercised and developed from his tenderest years. The boy of fifteen must be as perfect a seal-catcher as his father, and be able to make all the instruments necessary for the chase. In these inhospitable regions, every one is obliged to rely upon himself alone; there, where all the powers of the body and mind are tasked to the utmost for the mere sustenance of life, weakness and want of dexterity must inevitably succumb.

Besides the savages of the north, the civilised nations also give chase to the seals, or rather wage a barbarous war of extermination against these helpless creatures. Thus, from the year 1786 to 1833, more than 3,000,000 sea-bears were killed on the Pribilow Islands, in Behring's Sea. At Unalaschka, the chief staple-place of the Russian Fur Company, 700,000 skins were cast into the water in the year 1803, on the same principle as that which induced the Dutch to burn their superfluous nutmegs, viz. "not to glut the market." As a well-merited punishment for this stupid slaughter, the products of the chase diminished rapidly from that time until within the last few years, when a better husbandry has again increased the number of the sea-bears.

Unfortunately, our own countrymen and the Americans have done no better in the southern seas. Thousands of sea-lions used formerly to be killed on the South American coast, while at present the number of the animals is so much diminished as scarce to reward the sealer's trouble. Sir James Ross informs us that the sea elephant was formerly found in great numbers on Kerguelen's Land, and yearly attracted many vessels to those desert islands. But at present, after such incessant persecution, the animals have either migrated, or been almost totally extirpated. English and American captains often set some men ashore on the uninhabited coasts and islands of the southern seas, for the purpose of catching seals, boiling their oil, and stripping their skins. After a few months the ship generally returns to fetch the produce of their labours, or to bring a fresh supply of provisions to the seal catchers, who often remain several years in their solitary hunting grounds. But sometimes the poor wretches are abandoned by their associates, and then their despair may be imagined when week after week elapses without the expected sail appearing! Dumont d'Urville found one of these adventurers in the Straits of Magellan among a horde of Patagonians, who, though hospitably inclined, were themselves so poor as hardly to be able to keep body and soul together. He was a watchmaker from Geneva, who, having emigrated to New York, and finding himself disappointed, had listened to the fair promises of a skipper, who carried him out to Tierra del Fuego, and not finding the business answer, had left him to his fate. The French navigator took the poor man on board, and gave him a passage to Talcahuano in Chili.

On the east coast of North America seal catching is still carried on with considerable success. Newfoundland intercepts many of the immense fields and islands of ice which in the spring move south from the Arctic Sea. The interior parts, with the openings or lakes interspersed, remain serene and unbroken, and form the transitory abodes of myriads of seals. In the month of March upwards of three hundred small vessels, fitted out for the seal fishery, are extricated from the icy harbours on the east coast of Newfoundland; the fields are now all in motion, and the vessels plunge directly into the edges of such as appear to have seals on them; the crews, armed with firelocks and heavy bludgeons, there _land_, and in the course of a few weeks destroy nearly 300,000 of these animals. The Greenland winter, it would appear, is too severe for these luckless wanderers, and when it sets in, they accompany the field-ice, and remain on it until it is scattered and dissolved. Old and young being then deserted in the ocean, nature points out to them the course to their favourite icy haunts, and thither their herds hurry over the deep to pass an arctic summer. Winter returns, and with it commences again their annual migration from latitude to latitude. The Scotch ports,

## particularly Aberdeen, fit out ships for the spring seal-catching on the

American coast, and are generally successful in their undertakings.

[Illustration: Greenland Seal.]

[Illustration: Seal.]

According to the different numbers and forms of their canine teeth and grinders, and to the deficiency or presence of an _outward_ ear, the seal tribe is divided into many families, genera, and species, among which I shall select a few of the most remarkable for further notice. The Common Seal or Sea-calf, (_Calocephalus vitulinus_), which owes the latter name to the unharmonious accents of its voice, attains a length of from five to six feet. It has a large round head, small short neck, and several strong bristles on each side of its mouth, large eyes, no external ears, and a forked tongue. It has six fore teeth in the upper jaw, four in the lower, a strong pointed canine tooth on each side in both jaws, and a goodly row of sharp and jagged grinders. Woe to the poor herring whose evil star leads him between these engines of destruction--he is irrevocably lost! Different species of common seals inhabit the Northern seas, from Greenland and Spitzbergen to the mouth of the Scheldt, and from the White Sea to the eastern coast of America. Others are found in the Antarctic seas. An excellent swimmer, the seal dives like a shot, and rises at fifty yards' distance, often remaining full a quarter of an hour under the water--three times longer than the most strong-breasted and expert pearl fisher. Yet he is seldom seen more than thirty miles from land, where he sleeps and reposes, choosing rocks surrounded by the sea or the less accessible cliffs, left dry by the ebb of the tide, so that, if disturbed by an enemy, he may be able to plunge immediately into the sea. In the summer he will come out of the water to bask or sleep in the sun on the top of large stones and ledges of rocks; and this affords our countrymen the opportunity of shooting him. If he chances to escape, he hastens towards his proper element, flinging dirt or stones behind him as he scrambles along, at the same time expressing his fears by piteous moans; but if he happens to be overtaken, he will make a vigorous defence with his feet and teeth till he is killed. His flesh, which is tender, juicy, and fat, was formerly, like that of the porpoise, served up at the tables of the great, as appears from the bill of fare of a magnificent feast that Archbishop Neville gave in the reign of Edward the Fourth. Seals commonly bring forth two young ones at a time, which they suckle for about a fortnight, and then carry them out to sea to instruct them in swimming. When taken young, they may be domesticated, and will follow their master like a dog, coming to him when called by name. According to Pliny, no animal enjoys a deeper sleep,--"nullum animal graviore somno premitur." This assertion is, however, contradicted by general observation, for it is well known that seals are extremely watchful, seldom sleeping longer than a minute without moving their heads to ascertain whether anything suspicious is going on.

Although without external ears, seals appear to hear well both above and under the water. Music or whistling will draw them to the surface and induce them to stretch their necks to the utmost extent--a curiosity which often proves a snare for their destruction. The most effectual way of shooting seals is by firing small shot into their eyes; for when killed with a bullet they generally sink and are lost. They are often seen in very large shoals on their passage from one situation to another. In such cases, all appear every now and then at the surface together for the sake of respiration, springing up so as to run their heads, necks, and often their whole bodies out of the water. They shuffle along, especially over the ice, with a surprising speed considering the shortness of their legs. They are very tenacious of life, and able to survive even when shockingly mangled. According to Dr. Scoresby, the island of Jan Mayen affords excellent seal fishing in March and April. When on detached pieces of drift ice, they are captured by the use of boats, each boat making a descent upon a different herd. When the seals observe the boat, they endeavour to escape before it reaches the ice; the sailors, however, raise a long-continued shout, which frequently causes the amazed animals to delay their retreat until arrested by blows. When seals are abundant, the boat immediately pushes off after the slaughter is finished, and proceeds to another piece of ice for the increase of its harvest, leaving one man to flay off the skins and fat. But in situations where boats cannot navigate, the seal fishers have to pursue them over the ice, leaping from piece to piece until the capture is made; every man then flenses his own, and drags the skins and blubber to his boat or ship. Ships fitted out for seal fishing have occasionally procured cargoes of four or five thousand, yielding nearly a hundred tons of oil; but such enterprises are very hazardous, from the exposed nature of that dreary island, and the liability to heavy and sudden storms.

The Sea-Elephant (_Cystophora proboscidea_) deserves his name, not only from his immense size, attaining a length of twenty, twenty-five, or even thirty feet, but also from the singular structure of his elongated nostrils, which hang down when he is in a state of repose, but swell out to a foot-long proboscis when he is enraged. Then the beast has a most formidable appearance, which, along with its gaping jaws and dreadful roar, might strike terror into the boldest huntsman. But total helplessness and weakness conceal themselves behind this terrible mask, for a single blow upon the snout with a club suffices to fell the giant. Between 35° and 55° S. lat. is the home of the sea-elephant, where he frequents desert islands and uninhabited coasts. But even here, as I have already mentioned, he could not escape the rapacity of man, for his tough hide and the thick layer of blubber beneath were too tempting to remain unnoticed.

The Hooded Seal of the northern seas, (_Cystophora borealis_,) enjoys the same faculty of inflating a folding, skinny crest extending on each side from the snout to the eyes. But in spite of the menacing appearance of these wind-bags, the seal fisher knocks him on the head, draws, without ceremony, his skin over his ears, and throws his blubber into the oil-kettle.

The _Otarias_, or seals furnished with an external ear, and whose longer and more developed feet allow them to move more freely on land, rank in point of organisation at the head of the whole tribe. The most important and valuable of all is the Sea-Bear (_Arctocephalus ursinus_), of which there are probably two species; the one inhabiting the Antarctic seas, while the other roams about the coasts and islands of the Northern Pacific, and selects St. Paul, one of the Pribilow group in Behring's Sea, as its favourite summer haunt. The fine-haired, black, curly skin of the younger animals, of from four months to one year old, is particularly esteemed, so as to be classed among the finer furs which find a ready sale in the Chinese market, and serve to decorate the persons of the higher rank of mandarins. The chase, which on the latter island was formerly a promiscuous massacre, is now reduced to the slaughter of a limited number of victims. It begins in the latter part of September, on a cold foggy day when the wind blows from the side where the animals are assembled on the rocky shore. The boldest huntsmen, accustomed to clamber over stones and cliffs, open the way; then follow their less experienced comrades, and the chief personage of the band comes last, to be the better able to direct and survey the movements of his men, who are all armed with clubs. The main object is to cut off the herd as quickly as possible from the sea. All the grown-up males and females are spared, but the younger animals are all driven landwards, sometimes to the distance of a couple of miles, and then partly clubbed to death. Those which are only four months old are doomed without exception; while of the others only a certain number of the males are killed, and the females allowed to return again to the coast, when they soon betake themselves to the water. For several days after the massacre, the bereaved mothers swim about the island, seeking and loudly wailing for their young.

From the 5th of October, St. Paul is gradually deserted by the sea bears, who then migrate to the south, and reappear towards the end of April,--the males arriving first. Each seeks the same spot on the shore which he occupied during the preceding year, and lies down among the large stone blocks with which the flat beach is covered. About the middle of May the far more numerous females begin to make their appearance, and Otarian life takes full possession of the strand. The full-grown sea-bear is from eight to nine feet long, measures five in girth, and acquires a weight of from eight to nine hundred pounds. He owes his name to his shaggy blackish fur, and not to his disposition, which is far from being cruel or savage. He indulges in polygamy like a Turk or a Mormon, and has often as many as fifty wives. The young are generally lively, fond of play and fight. When one of them has thrown another down, the father approaches with a growl, caresses the victor, tries to overturn him, and shows increasing fondness the better he defends himself. Lazy and listless youngsters are objects of his dislike, and these hang generally about their mother. The male is very much attached to his wives, but treats them with all the severity of an oriental despot. When a mother neglects to carry away her young, and allows it to be taken, she is made to feel his anger. He seizes her with his teeth, and strikes her several times, not over gently, against a cliff. As soon as she recovers from the stunning effects of these blows, she approaches her lord in the most humble attitudes, crawls to his feet, caresses him, and even sheds tears, as Steller, the companion of Behring's second voyage, informs us. Meanwhile the male crawls about to and fro, gnashes his teeth, rolls his eyes, and throws his head from side to side. But when he sees that his young is irrevocably lost, he then, like the mother, begins to cry so bitterly, that the tears trickle down upon his breast. In his old age the ursine seal is abandoned by his wives, and spends the remainder of his life in solitude, fasting, and sleeping; an indolence from which he can only be roused by the intrusion of another animal, when a tremendous battle is the consequence. Though extremely irascible, the sea-bears are lovers of fair play, so that when two are fighting, the others form a ring, and remain spectators until the contest is decided. Then, however, they take the part of the weaker, which so enrages the victor that he immediately attacks the peace-makers. These in turn fall out, the dreadful roaring attracts new witnesses, and the whole ends, like an Irish wedding, with a general fight.

Ursine seals are also found in the southern hemisphere, on desert coasts analogous to their residences in the north. Common seals and sea-otters stand in great awe of these animals, and shun their haunts. They again are in equal fear of the Leonine seals, and do not care to begin a quarrel in their presence, dreading the intervention of such formidable arbitrators, who likewise possess the first place on the shore.

Steller's Sea-Lion, (_Otaria Stelleri_,) is about as large again as the sea-bear, but its tawny hide, covered with short bristles, is without value in the fur trade. To the Aleut, however, the animal is of great use, for he covers his boat with its skin, makes his water-tight _kamleika_ with its intestines, the soles of his shoes with the webs of its feet, ornaments his cap with its long beard hair, and feasts upon its flesh. On all the coasts and islands of the Pacific this sea-lion is found, from 61° N. lat. to unknown southern limits, but nowhere in such numbers as on the Pribilow Island, St. George, where its countless herds afford a wonderful spectacle. The shapeless gigantic fat and flesh-masses, awkward and unwieldy on land, cover, as far as the eye can reach, a broad, rocky, naked strand-belt, blackened with oil. The sea-birds occupy the empty places between the herds of the sea-lions, and fly fearlessly before the gaping jaws of the huge monsters, without caring about their hideous bellowing. In countless numbers they build their nests in the caves of the surf-beaten cliffs, and among the large boulders on the shore, whose tops are whitened with their dung. A thick fog generally spreads over the desolate scene, and the hollow roaring of the breakers unites, with the screaming of the birds and the bellowing of the sea-lions, to form a wild and melancholy concert.

Steller's sea-lion is furnished only with an erect and curly hair-tuft at his neck, while a complete mane flows round the breast of the sea-lion of the southern hemisphere, (_Otaria jubata_). The remainder of the body is covered with short smooth hairs, or bristles. The sea-lioness has no mane, and is darker than the male. The fore-fins have the appearance of large pieces of black tough leather, showing, instead of nails, slight horny elevations; the hind-fins, which are likewise black, have a closer resemblance to feet, and the five toes are furnished with small nails. A formidable-looking beast, eleven feet long! and well may the naturalist start, when, walking through the high tussack grass of the Falkland Islands, he suddenly stumbles over a huge sea-lion, stretched along the ground, and blocking up his path.

[Illustration: Walrus, or Morse.]

[Illustration: Skull and Head of Walrus.]

The Arctic Walrus forms the nearest approach to the seals in the scale of creation, and is likewise better adapted for a marine life than for existence on dry land. But he is completely without fore-teeth, and his grinders have a broad furrowed crown, like those of the herbivorous animals. This difference of dentition points to a different food, and while the phocæ are such voracious fish-eaters that Sir James Ross found no less than twenty-eight pounds of undigested fish in the stomach of a southern seal, the walrus principally lives on sea-weeds and molluscs. The Arctic walrus or sea-horse (_Trichechus rosmarus_) is one of the largest mammals known, as he sometimes grows to the length of eighteen feet, and so thick as to measure twelve feet about the middle of the body. His form is very clumsy, having a small head, a strong elongated neck, a thick body, and short legs, the hind feet uniting to a broad fin. With such a form, no one can wonder at the clumsiness of its movements on land. Admiral Beechey describes the gallop of a sea-horse as probably the most awkward motion exhibited by the animal tribe, for, like a large caterpillar, the unwieldly creature alternately lowers and raises its head, in order to facilitate the bringing up of the hinder parts of the body;--no easy task, when we consider the immense weight of the animal, and the great disproportion between the length of its body and its legs. The upper lip, which is very thick, and indented or cleft into two large rounded lobes, furnished with thick yellow bristles, contributes also but little to its external beauty. From under this formidable-looking inflation protrude two large and long tusks, growing, like those of the elephant, from the upper jaw, but bent downwards, not outward and upwards, as is the case with the latter. Their uses are also very different, for while the elephant employs his tusks in digging up roots, the walrus raises by their assistance his unwieldy body upon the ice-blocks and precipitous shores, where he loves to bask in the sun. Both animals use them, moreover, as formidable weapons, the former against the bounding tiger, the latter against the hungry ice-bear or the voracious shark.

In fine weather the walruses, like the seals, gather on the ice, where they may be seen in herds consisting occasionally of upwards of 100 animals each. In these situations they appear greatly to enjoy themselves, rolling and sporting about, and frequently making the air resound with their bellowing, which bears some resemblance to that of a bull. These diversions generally end in sleep, during which these wary animals appear always to take the precaution of having a sentinel to warn them of any danger to which they may be liable. So universal seems the observance of this precaution amongst their species, that Beechey, who had many opportunities of observing them in Spitzbergen, scarcely ever saw a herd, however small, in which he did not notice one of the party on the watch, stretching his long neck in the air every half-minute, to the utmost extent of its muscles, to survey the ground about him. In the event of any alarming appearances, the sentinel begins by seeking his own safety; and as these animals always lie huddled upon one another, the motion of one is immediately communicated to the whole group, which is instantly in motion towards the water. When the herd is large, and an alarm is given, the consequences are most ludicrous. From the unwieldy nature of the animals, the state of fear into which they are thrown, and their being so closely packed together, at first they tumble over one another, get angry, and in their endeavour to regain their feet flounder about in each other's way, till having at last scrambled to the edge of the ice, they tumble into the water, head first, if possible, but otherwise, in any position in which chance may have placed them, occasioning one of the most laughable scenes it is possible to conceive.

Though the first movement of the walruses at the approach of danger is to seek the water, yet here, enraged by an unprovoked attack, they often become most formidable assailants; of which Beechey recounts a remarkable instance.

[Illustration: THE BOATS OF H.M.S. TRENT ATTACKED BY WALRUSES.]

THE BOATS OF H.M.S. TRENT ATTACKED BY WALRUSES.

This plate is taken from an incident narrated in the account of the voyage of H.M. ships Dorothea and Trent. The boat belonging to the Trent was attacked by a shoal of walruses, which were near swamping it; and were not driven off till a gigantic walrus, which appeared to be the captain of the shoal, was destroyed by a shot fired into its throat as represented in the engraving, the original of which, as published in the account of the voyage, was taken from a sketch by an officer present in the singular conflict.

One evening, while the Dorothea and Trent were at anchor in Magdalena Bay, Spitzbergen, several herds of these animals had crawled upon the ice, to enjoy the fine weather and rest themselves. The boats, properly equipped, and manned with some of the officers and seamen, pushed off in pursuit of them. The first herd which was selected disappointed the sportsmen, but another was so intent upon its gambols, that the sentinel absolutely forgot his duty, and several of the crew managed to effect a landing upon the ice without any alarm being given to the animals; as soon, however, as the first musket was fired, the affrighted group made such a desperate rush towards the edge of the ice that they nearly overturned the whole of the assailing party, purposely stationed there to intercept them. The seamen, finding this charge more formidable than they expected, were obliged to separate to allow their opponents to pass through their ranks; and being thus in their turn taken by surprise, they suffered them, almost unmolested, to perform their somersaults towards the sea. What with their uncertain movements, the extreme toughness of their skin, and the respectful distance at which the men were obliged to keep, to avoid the lashing of the head and tusks of the animals, it was indeed no easy task to inflict any serious injury upon them. One, however, was desperately wounded in the head with a ball, and the mate of the brig, being determined if possible to secure his prey, resolutely struck his tomahawk into his skull; but the enraged animal, with a twist of its head, sent the weapon whirling in the air, and then lashing his neck, as though he would destroy with his immense tusks everything that came in his way, effected his escape to the water. The seamen followed and pushed off in their boats; but the walruses, finding themselves more at home now than on the ice, in their turn became the assailants. They rose in great numbers about the boats, snorting with rage, and rushing at the boats, and it was with the utmost difficulty they were prevented upsetting or staving them by placing their tusks upon the gunwales, or by striking at them with their heads. It was the opinion of the seamen that in this assault the walruses were led on by one animal in particular, a much larger and more formidable beast than any of the others, and they directed their efforts more particularly towards him; but he withstood all the blows of their tomahawks without flinching, and his tough hide resisted the entry of the whale lances, which were unfortunately not very sharp, and soon bent double. The herd was so numerous, and their attacks so incessant, that there was not time to load a musket, which indeed was the only effectual mode of seriously injuring them. The purser fortunately had his gun loaded, and the whole now being nearly exhausted with chopping and striking at their assailants, he snatched it up, and thrusting the muzzle down the throat of the leader, fired into his bowels. The wound proved mortal and the animal fell back amongst his companions, who immediately desisted from the attack, assembled round him, and in a moment quitted the boat, swimming away as hard as they could with their leader, whom they actually bore up with their tusks, and assiduously preserved from sinking. Whether this singular and compassionate conduct, which in all probability was done to prevent suffocation, arose from the sagacity of the animals, it is difficult to say; but there is every probability of it, and the fact must form an interesting trait in the history of the habits of the species. After the discharge of the purser's gun, there remained of all the herd only one little assailant, which the seamen, out of compassion, were unwilling to molest. This young animal had been observed fighting by the side of the leader, and from the protection which was afforded it by its courageous patron, was imagined to be one of its young. This little animal had no tusks, but it swam violently against the boat, and struck her with its head, and indeed would have stove her, had it not been kept off by whale lances, some of which made deep incisions in its young sides. These, however, had not any immediate effect; the attack was continued, and the enraged little animal, though disfigured with wounds, even crawled upon the ice in pursuit of the seamen, who had _relanded_ there, until one of them, out of compassion, put an end to its sufferings.

The valuable ivory of its tusks, which is more solid, finer grained, and whiter than that of the elephant, exposes the walrus to the attacks of man, no less than his thick hide, from which a strong elastic leather is made, and his abundance of flesh and blubber. The former are sought by civilised nations, while the latter forms the chief food of the northern Esquimaux and of the Tschutchi on the western shore of Behring's Straits.

Every year a troop of Aleuts land on the northern coast of the peninsula of Aliaska, where the young walruses assemble in great numbers during the summer, having most likely been driven away by the older males from their more northern haunts. The walruses herd on the lowest edge of the coast which is within reach of the high spring-tides. When the Aleuts prepare to attack the animals, they take leave of each other as if they were going to face death, being no less afraid of the mighty tusks of the walruses than of the awkwardness of their own companions. Armed with lances and heavy axes, they stealthily approach the walruses, and having disposed their ranks, suddenly fall upon them with loud shouts, and endeavour to drive them from the sea, taking care that none of them escape into the water, as in this case the rest would irresistibly follow and precipitate the huntsmen along with them. As soon as the walruses have been driven far enough up the strand, the Aleuts attack them with their lances, endeavouring to strike at them in places where the hide is not so thick, and then pressing with all their might against the spear, to render the wound deep and deadly. The slaughtered animals fall one over the other and form large heaps, while the huntsmen, uttering furious shouts and intoxicated with carnage, wade through the bloody mire. They then cleave the jaws and take out the tusks, which are the chief objects of the slaughter of several thousands of walruses, since neither their flesh nor their fat is made use of in the colony. Sir George Simpson, in his "Overland Journey Round the World," relates that the bales of fur sent to Kjachta are covered with walrus hide; then it is made to protect the tea chests, which find their way to Moscow; and after all these wanderings, the far-travelled skin returns again to its native seas, when, cut into small pieces and stamped with a mark, it serves as a medium of exchange. The carcases of the wholesale slaughter are left on the shore to be washed away by the spring-tides, which soon erase every vestige of the bloody scene, and in the following year the inexhaustible north sends new victims to the coast.

Kane gives us a vivid description of a walrus hunt in Smith's Sound, most likely the most northern point of the earth inhabited by man. "After a while Myouk became convinced, from signs or sounds, that walruses were waiting for him in a small space of recently open water that was glazed over with a few days' growth of ice, and, moving gently on, soon heard the characteristic bellow of a bull,--the walrus, like some bipeds, being fond of his own music. The party now formed in single file, and moved on in serpentine approach to the recently frozen ice spots, which were surrounded by older and firmer ice. When within half a mile the line broke, and each man crawled towards a separate pool. In a few minutes the walruses were in sight, five in number, rising at intervals through the ice in a body with an explosive puff that might have been heard for miles. Two large grim-looking males made themselves conspicuous as leaders of the group. When the walrus is above the water, the hunter lies flat and motionless; as it begins to sink, he is alert and ready for a spring. The animal's head is hardly below the water line, when every man advances in rapid run, and again, as if by instinct, before the beast returns, all are motionless behind protecting knolls of ice. In this way the Esquimaux have reached a plate of thin ice, hardly strong enough to bear them, at the very brink of the pool. Myouk, till now phlegmatic, seems to waken with excitement. A coil of walrus hide lies by his side, and he grasps the harpoon, ready for action. Presently the water is in motion, and, puffing with pent-up respiration, the walrus rises before him. Myouk rises slowly, the right arm thrown back, the left flat at his side. The walrus looks about him, shaking water from his crest, Myouk throws up his left arm, and the animal, rising breast-high, fixes one look before he plunges. It has cost him all that curiosity can cost, for the harpoon lies buried under his left flipper." The wounded animal makes a desperate spring, and endeavours to lift itself upon the ice, which breaks under its weight. These fruitless endeavours give its physiognomy a still more vengeful expression; its bellowing degenerates into a roar, and crimson foam gathers round its mouth.

[Illustration: Polar Bear (Ursus maritimus).]

The Ice-Bear (_Ursus maritimus_) may also be reckoned among the marine animals, as the sea affords him by far the greater part of his food. From the common bear, whom he surpasses in strength and size, as he attains a length of nine feet, and a height of four, he not only distinguishes himself by his white sleek-haired fur, but also by a much longer neck. His half-webbed feet show at once that he is born for a sea life, and he is able to swim three miles an hour, and to dive for a considerable length of time. On land he runs as fast again as a man, and often surprises his prey, as his tread upon the snow is almost inaudible. He principally lives on fish, but also on seals, birds, foxes, reindeer, and even attacks man--particularly when pinched with hunger. But in his turn he falls a prey to the inhabitants of the Arctic regions, who eat the flesh, though it is very coarse, and use the skin for coverings of various kinds. He is a cunning hunter, though not always successful. Thus one sunshiny day, Admiral Beechey saw a large walrus rise in a pool of water not very far from where he stood. After looking around, the grim-visaged creature drew his greasy carcase upon the ice, where he rolled about for a time, and at length laid himself down to sleep. A bear, which had probably been observing his movements, crawled carefully upon the ice on the opposite side of the pool, and began to roll about also, but apparently more with design than amusement, progressively lessening the distance that intervened between him and his prey. The suspicious walrus drew himself up, preparatory to a precipitate retreat, when immediately the bear remained motionless, as if in the act of sleep; but after a time he began to lick his paws, and clean himself, and occasionally to encroach a little more upon his intended victim. This time, however, his cunning was useless, for the walrus suddenly plunged into the pool, and though the bear, throwing off all disguise, rushed to the spot and followed him in an instant into the water, he was most likely disappointed of a meal that would have made up for a long period of fasting. The ice-bear is everywhere at home within the Arctic circle, and particularly abounds on Spitzbergen and the other small islands of that sea. He sometimes comes floating on drift ice to the north coasts of Iceland, Norway, and Newfoundland, but is soon killed by the inhabitants.

[Illustration: Seal.]

[Illustration: Arctic Walrus.]

Manby, in his "Voyage to Spitzbergen," relates several interesting examples of his ferocity and daring. Having perceived an ice-bear swimming in the sea, a boat went after him to cut him off; when suddenly the monster changed his route, faced the boat, and approached it, keeping up a continued growling, with other indications of rage, such as showing his frightful teeth, and elevating his head and much of his body out of the water. Being desirous to preserve the head, Manby let him come within twelve yards, when he fired a ball through his shoulder, which deprived him of the use of a fore-leg. Roaring hideously, the infuriated animal pressed towards the boat in the most ferocious manner, endeavouring to board or upset it, but failed from the loss of his leg. He was then attacked by the crew with lances, the thrusts of some of which he avoided with astonishing dexterity, and, in the most resolute manner, again made several attempts to reach the boat; but being repulsed by the overpowering thrust of a lance from the harpooner on his flank, he was unable longer to continue the contest. He had bitten a lance, in the heat of the combat, with such exasperated rage, as to break one of his long tusks; but finding his efforts fruitless, he retreated towards the ice, swimming most astonishingly fast, considering the great propelling power he had lost, and finally ascended it with great difficulty, having only one fore-paw to assist him, when, exhausted by the effort, he fell down dead, uttering a tremendous growl.

Captain Lewis, with a party of five hunters, attacked a bear, and when at a distance of forty yards, four of them fired, and each lodged a musket ball in its body, two of which passed directly through the lungs. The enraged animal ran at them with open mouth, and as it came near, the two men who had reserved their fire gave it two wounds, and broke its shoulder, which retarded its motion for a moment. But before they could reload, it was so near that they were obliged to run, and before they reached the shore the bear had almost overtaken them. Two jumped into the canoe, the other four separated, concealed themselves behind ice blocks, and firing as fast as they could load, struck the bear several times. But although eight balls had passed through its body, the bear pursued two of them so closely, that they were obliged to leap down a perpendicular bank of twenty feet into the water. The dying animal sprang after them, and was within a few feet of the hindermost, when his strength at last failed him.

Scoresby relates that in 1783, Captain Cook, of the Archangel, of Lynn, landed on the coast of Spitzbergen, accompanied by the surgeon and mate. While traversing the shore, the captain was unexpectedly attacked by a bear, which seized him in an instant between its paws. At this awful juncture, when a moment's pause must have been fatal to him, the unfortunate man called to his surgeon to fire, who immediately, with admirable resolution and steadiness, discharged his piece, and providentially shot the bear through the head, thus literally saving the master from the jaws of death.

[Illustration: Ice-bear approaching the "Dorothea" and "Trent."]

"One evening," says Beechey, "we set on fire some sea-horse fat, in order to entice within reach of our muskets any bears that might be ranging the ice; as these animals possess a very keen scent, and are invariably attracted by burnt animal matter. About midnight we had the satisfaction of seeing one of them drag his huge carcass out of the water, and slowly make his way towards us. The sight of the tall masts of the ships appeared to alarm him a little at first, for he occasionally hesitated, threw up his head, and seemed half inclined to turn round and be off; but the agreeable odour of the burnt blubber was evidently so grateful to his olfactory nerves and empty stomach, that it overcame every repugnance, and gradually brought him within range of our muskets. On receiving the first shot he sprang round, uttered a terrific growl, and half raised himself upon his hind legs, as if in expectation of seizing the object that had caused him such excruciating pain; and woe to any human being who had at that moment been within reach of his merciless paws! The second and third ball left him writhing upon the ice, and the mate of the Dorothea jumped out of the vessel and endeavoured to despatch him with the butt end of a musket; but it unfortunately broke short off, and for a moment left him at the mercy of his formidable antagonist, who showed, by turning sharply upon his assailant, and seizing him by the thigh, that he was not yet mastered; and he would most certainly have inflicted a serious wound, had it not been for the prompt assistance of two or three of his shipmates who had followed him. The animal was by no means one of the largest of his species, being only six feet in length, and three feet four inches in height. His stomach was quite empty, with the exception of a garter, such as is used by Greenland sailors to tie up their boat stockings. In his left side there was a cicatrised wound of considerable magnitude. From what we saw of the activity and ferociousness of this animal, added to the well-known strength of his species, we readily gave credit to the accounts of Barentz and other early visitors to these regions; and it may be considered a fortunate circumstance for the hero of the Nile and Trafalgar that a natural barrier was interposed between him and the object of his chase, when in his youth he ventured alone over the ice in these regions in pursuit of such formidable game."

The ferocious white bear, the enemy and the dread of all other animals that come within its reach, is exceedingly tender and affectionate to its young, of which the following anecdote affords a striking and interesting example. While the "Carcase" was locked in the ice, early one morning the man at the mast-head gave notice that three bears were making their way very fast over the frozen ocean, and were directing their course towards the ship. They had no doubt been invited by the scent of some blubber of a sea-horse that the crew had killed a few days before, which had been set on fire; for they drew out of the flames a part of the flesh that remained unconsumed, and ate it voraciously. The crew from the ship threw great lumps of the flesh of the sea-horse, which they had still left, upon the ice, which the old bear fetched singly, laid every lump before her cubs as she brought it, and dividing it, gave to each a share, reserving but a small portion to herself. As she was fetching away the last piece, they levelled their muskets at the cubs and shot them both dead, and in her retreat they wounded the dam, but not mortally. It would have drawn tears of pity from any but unfeeling minds, to have marked the affectionate concern expressed by this poor beast in the dying moments of her expiring young. Though she was herself dreadfully wounded, and could but just crawl to the place where they lay, she carried the lump of flesh she had fetched away, as she had done others before, tore it in pieces, and laid it before them; and when she saw that they refused to eat, she laid her paws first upon one and then upon the other, and endeavoured to raise them up, piteously moaning all the while. When she found she could not stir them, she went off, and when she had got at some distance, looked back and moaned; and that not availing her to entice them away, she returned, and smelling round them, began to lick their wounds. She went off a second time as before, and having crawled a few paces, looked again behind her, and for some time stood moaning. But still her cubs not rising to follow her, she returned to them again, and with signs of inexpressible fondness, went round one and round the other, pawing them and moaning. Finding at last that they were cold and lifeless, she raised her head towards the ship, and uttered a growl of despair, which the murderers returned with a volley of musket balls. She fell between her cubs, and died licking their wounds.

The Sea-Otter is the last of the marine mammiferous animals that claim our attention. Although it is also found in the southern Pacific, yet its chief resort is in the Behring's Sea, along the chain of the Aleut Islands. It is but a small animal, yet its long-haired, beautifully fine and black fur, which is not seldom paid for with 400 or 500 rubles, renders it by far the most important product of those seas. It has even got an historical interest, since it has been the chief cause which led the Russians from Ochotzk to Kamtschatka, and from thence over the Aleut chain to the opposite coast of America.

[Illustration: Sea-Otter.]

The Aleut islanders show a wonderful dexterity in the capture of this animal. In April or May they assemble at an appointed spot in their light skin-boats, or _baidars_, and choose one of the most respected _tamols_, or chiefs, for the leader of the expedition, which generally numbers from fifty to a hundred boats. Such hunting-parties are annually organised from the Kurile Islands to Kadjack, and consequently extend over a line of three thousand miles. On the first fine day the expedition sets out, and proceeds to a distance of about forty wersts from the coast, when the baidars form into a long line, leaving an interval of about two hundred and fifty fathoms from boat to boat as far as a sea-otter diving out of the water can be seen; so that a row of thirty baidars occupies a space of from ten to twelve wersts. When the number of the boats is greater, the intervals are reduced. Every man now looks upon the sea with concentrated attention. Nothing escapes the penetrating eye of the Aleut; in the smallest black spot appearing but one moment over the surface of the waters, his experienced glance at once recognises a sea-otter. The baidar which first sees the animal, rows rapidly towards the place where the creature dived, and now the Aleut, holding his oar straight up in the air, remains motionless on the spot. Immediately the whole squadron is in motion, and the long straight line changes into a wide circle, the centre of which is occupied by the baidar with the raised oar. The otter not being able to remain long under water, re-appears, and the nearest Aleut immediately greets him with an arrow. This first attack is seldom mortal; very often the missile does not even reach its over-distant mark, and the sea-otter instantly disappears. Again the oar rises from the next baidar; again the circle forms, but this time narrower than at first; the fatigued otter is obliged to come oftener to the surface, arrows fly from all sides, and finally the animal, killed by a mortal shot, or exhausted by repeated wounds, falls to the share of the archer who has hit it nearest to the head. If several otters appear at the same time, the boats form as many rings, provided their number be sufficiently great. All these movements are executed with astonishing celerity and precision, and amidst the deepest silence, which is only interrupted from time to time by the hissing sound of the flying arrows.

[Illustration: Banded Dipper.]

CHAP. X.

SEA-BIRDS.

Their vast Numbers.--Strand-Birds.--Artifices of the Sea-Lark to protect its Young.--Migrations of the Strand-Birds.--The Sea-Birds in General.--The Anatidæ.--The Eider Duck.--The Sheldrake.--The Loggerheaded Duck.--Auks and Penguins.--The Cormorant.--Its Use by the Chinese for Fish catching.--The Frigate Bird.--The Soland Goose.--The Gulls.--The Petrels.--The Albatross.--Bird-catching on St. Kilda.--The Guano of the Chincha Islands.

[Illustration: Flamingo.]

Countless are the birds of the wood and field, of the mountain and the plain; and yet it is doubtful whether they equal in number those of the fish-teeming seas. For every naked rock or surf-beaten cliff that rises over the immeasurable deserts of ocean, is the refuge of myriads of sea-birds; every coast, from the poles to the equator, is covered with their legions and far from land, their swarms hover over the solitudes of the deep. Many, unfit for swimming, seek their food along the shores; others rival the fishes in their own native element; and others, again, armed with indefatigable wings, pursue their prey upon the high seas. But, however different the mode of living and destination of the numerous tribes, families, genera, and species of the sea-birds may be, each of them is organised in the most perfect manner for the exigencies of its own peculiar sphere. Take, for instance, the Strand-birds, that live on the margin of ocean, and feast upon the molluscs and sea-worms, that inhabit the littoral zone. How admirably the light weight of their proportionally small body suits the soft, yielding soil on which they have to seek their food; how well their long legs are adapted for striding through the mud of the shallow waters; and their long bill and flexible neck, how beautifully formed for seizing their fugitive prey, ere it can bury itself deep enough in the safe mud or sand!

PENGUINS ON THE SOUTH POLAR ICE.

A scene showing the immense droves of penguins which often clothe the sea edges of the ice and rocks in the South Polar regions is represented in the annexed plate.

The individuals in the front are of the large species known as the Great Penguin, _Aptenodytes Forsteri_. Beyond is a group of the lesser, but perhaps more beautiful, species, _Aptenodytes Pennantii_.

In the distance are seen lines of another small kind, which has been made a separate genus, under the denomination of _Eudyptes_. It is inferior in characteristic beauty to either of the last named. _Eudyptes antipodes_ is, however, worthy of a better representation than the dimensions of our plate permitted.

[Illustration: PENGUINS ON THE SOUTH POLAR ICE.]

[Illustration: Curlew.]

The wonderful art with which the feathered inhabitants of the grove construct their nests, we should in vain look for among the Strand-birds, but the anxiety they show in protecting their young brood, and the stratagems they use to divert the attention of the enemy, are after all instincts no less admirable than those which prompt the Cassique or the Tailor-bird to build their complicated dwellings. Thus on the approach of any person to its nest, the Lapwing flutters round his head with great inquietude, and if he persists in advancing, it will endeavour to draw him away by running along the ground as if lame, and thereby inviting pursuit. The Golden Plover also, when it sees an enemy---man or dog---approach, does not await their arrival, but advances to meet them. Then suddenly rising with a shrill cry, as if just disturbed from its nest, it flutters along the ground as if crippled, and entices them farther and farther from its young. The dogs, expecting to catch an easy prey, follow the lame bird, which suddenly, however, flies off with lightning speed, and leaves its disappointed pursuers on the beach. The discovery of the nest is rendered still more difficult by the colour and markings of the eggs assimilating so closely to that of the ground and surrounding herbage.

The Scoopers, Oyster-catchers, Avosets, and other strand-birds have recourse to similar stratagems for the protection of their young. In New Zealand, the French naturalists, Quoy and Gaimard, were deceived by an oyster-catcher, which, having been shot at, feigned to be wounded, and with hanging wing, diverted them from the right track.

[Illustration: Avoset.]

The strand-birds of the high northern regions fly from the winter to coasts where milder winds are blowing. But as soon as the summer's sun begins to exert its power, the desert shores of the Arctic Ocean become animated with swarms of plovers, sand-pipers, rails, herons, and phalaropes, to whom the thawed strand opens its inexhaustible supplies. Soon, however, the approach of winter hardens once more the soil, want follows upon abundance, and the whole long-legged host hastens to abandon the ice-bound strand, which opposes an impenetrable armour to their beaks.

[Illustration: Plover.]

The food of the different kinds of strand-birds varies, and consequently their bills are variously formed. Those that live upon worms have generally a long thin awl-shaped bill, well fitted for picking their prey out of the soft muddy or sandy soil. If the small creatures conceal themselves under large stones, they are secure from these attacks; but then comes the Turn-stone, (_Tringa interpres_,) who with his bill, a little turned up at the top, raises the stone as with a lever, and makes sad havoc amongst the defenceless garrison.

[Illustration: Scissor-bill (Rhynchops nigra).]

The Sea-pie uses its wedge-shaped bill for opening shell-fish with great adroitness; but the industry of the Black Skimmer or Cut-water, (_Rhynchops nigra_,) is still more remarkable. The bill of this bird, which chiefly inhabits the hot coasts of America, is quite unique in its kind; the under mandible, which is in fact nothing but a wedge, being about an inch longer than the upper one, by which it is clasped. The sandy beach of Penco, says Lesson, is full of shell-fish, which remain nearly dry at low water in small pools. The skimmer keeps waiting close by until one of them opens its shell, when he immediately introduces his wedge. He then seizes the mussel, beats it to pieces upon the sand, and devours it with all the pleasure of an epicure eating an oyster. He is also very active in sweeping the surface of the water, from which he skims, as it were, the smaller fish or shrimps. Thus, on all flat sandy shores nothing exists, either soft or hard, creeping or swimming, jumping or running, that does not find among the strand-birds its peculiar and admirably armed enemy, or that can boast of a perfect immunity from hostile attacks.

[Illustration: Speckled Diver.]

If we examine the real sea-birds, such as are formed for indefatigable swimming or diving, or for wide flights over the deserts of ocean, we shall find them no less wonderfully organised than the winged dwellers on the strand. Their short compressed toes easily cleave the waters, and by means of their membranes or webs form, as it were, broad oars. Their muscular short legs, placed more behind than in other birds, are beautifully adapted for rowing, although their movements on land are awkward and slow. All creatures living on the sea of course require a thick waterproof mantle against weather and storm; and consequently we find the plumage of sea birds thicker, closer, and better furnished with down than that of the other feathered tribes. And finally, the gland which all birds have at the rump, and from which they express an oily matter to preserve their feathers moist, is most considerable among those that live upon the water, and contributes to make their plumage impermeable. Surely the sea bird has no right to complain of imperfect clothing or a deficient outfit!

[Illustration: Snow Goose.]

The numerous members of the duck family, or the Anatidæ, mostly live during the summer in higher latitudes, and wander in winter in countless swarms towards sunnier regions; as, for instance, the Snow Goose and the Barnacle. Some remain throughout the year in Great Britain, some only during the winter; while others, which are more particularly birds of the Arctic zone, but very seldom make their appearance in our southern clime. Most Anatidæ prefer the lake, the river, the pond, or the morass; but many of them are true littoral birds, and spend a great part of their time swimming and fishing in the sea.

[Illustration: Barnacle Goose.]

The Eider Duck, (_Anas mollissima_,) which attains nearly double the size of the common duck, inhabits the higher latitudes of Europe, Asia, and America. One of its most remarkable breeding places is on the small island of Vidoë near Reikiavik (Iceland), where it lives under the protection of the law; a person who should chance to kill a breeding bird having to pay a fine of thirty dollars.

[Illustration: Eider Duck.]

"As our boat approached the shore," says Mackenzie, ("Voyage through Iceland,") "we came through a multitude of these beautiful birds, who hardly gave themselves the trouble to move out of the way. Between the landing place and the house of the old governor the ground was covered with them, and it was necessary to walk cautiously not to tread upon their nests. The ganders went about with a cackle resembling the cooing of a pigeon, and were even more familiar than our common duck. Round about the house, on the garden wall, on the roofs, even in the inside of the huts and the chapel, they sat breeding in great numbers. Those which had not been long upon their nest generally left it at our approach, but those which had more than one or two eggs remained undisturbed, allowed themselves to be handled, and sometimes even gently used their bills to remove our hand. The nests were lined with down, which the mother plucks from her own breast; and near at hand a sufficient quantity was piled up to cover the eggs when she goes to feed, which is generally at low water. The downs are twice removed, but sometimes the poor duck is obliged to provide for a fourth lining; and when she has no more to spare, the gander willingly deprives himself of part of his showy snow-white and rose-red garment. The eggs, which are considered a great delicacy, are also partially taken away. Our Vidoë friend used to send us two hundred at a time. When boiled, they are tolerably good, but always very inferior to those of our domestic hen. When taken from the nest, the downs are of course mixed with feathers and straw; and to sort and prepare them for sale is part of the winter employment of the women. One nest furnishes about a quarter of a pound of cleaned downs. The softness, lightness, and elasticity of these feathers is universally known. A few handfuls of compressed downs suffice to fill a whole coverlet, under which the northlander bids defiance to the strongest winter cold. Almost as soon as the young have left the egg, the mother conducts them to the water's edge, takes them on her back, and swims a few yards with them, when she dives, and leaves them on the surface to take care of themselves. As soon as they have thus acquired the art of swimming, the duck returns and becomes their leader. The broods often unite in great numbers, and remain some weeks quite wild, after which they disappear. Long before we left Iceland not a single duck was to be seen. No one knows to what parts they migrate. The bird is found on the Flannen Islands, to the west of Lewis; it is seen on the Shetland and Orkney Islands; it breeds on May Island, at the mouth of the Frith of Forth." Even on Heligoland the eider duck sometimes makes its appearance, but not to breed. The produce of the eider duck, either for personal use or as an article of trade, contributes to the comforts of many northern nations. The Esquimaux kill these birds with darts, pursuing them in their little boats, watching their course by the air bubbles when they dive, and always striking at them when they rise wearied to the surface. Their flesh is valued as food, and their skins are made into warm and comfortable under garments.

The Long-tailed Duck and the Sheldrake or Burrow Duck, (_Anas glacialis_ _tadorna_), likewise inhabit the northern shores of Europe, Asia, and America. The former often remains the whole year in the high north, bidding defiance to the icy winter of the Arctic circle, and enjoying during the summer the light of an uninterrupted day. Often, however, it migrates to the south, and wanders from Greenland and Hudson's Bay as far as New York, and from Spitzbergen and Iceland to Heligoland and the Schleswig Islands. The duck likewise lines her nest with her downs. During the winter, the sheldrake is often seen in the west of England and in Ireland, where it is caught in nets. On Sylt, on the Danish coast, it is half domesticated, living in artificial burrows, and breeding even in the villages, on walls, and in earth holes. In a pleasant valley among the downs, which, although without trees, refreshed the eye with a verdant carpet variegated with flowers, Naumann, the celebrated German ornithologist, saw thousands of sheldrakes scattered in couples over the meads, so tame that they could be approached within twenty paces, when they flew up, but soon again alighted on the sward. He admired the construction of the artificial nests, often thirteen in one cavity, with a common entrance, and communicating by horizontal tunnels. Over every nest is a perpendicular opening, decked with a sod. On this being raised the duck is often seen sitting on her nest, so tame that it allows itself to be stroked. Every householder possesses several of these artificial burrows, from which he daily gathers during several weeks from twenty to thirty eggs, leaving six in each nest to be hatched. He also takes care to remove one half of the beautiful downs, which are no less light and valuable than those of the eider duck.

[Illustration: Sheldrake.]

One of the most curious members of the duck family is the large Loggerheaded Duck or goose (_Anas brachyptera_) of the Falkland Islands, which sometimes weighs twenty-two pounds. It was formerly called, from its extraordinary manner of paddling and splashing upon the water, race-horse, but is now named, much more appropriately, steamer. Its wings are too small and weak to allow of flight, but by their aid, partly swimming and partly flapping the surface of the water, it moves very quickly. The manner is something like that by which the common house duck escapes when pursued by a dog; but Mr. Darwin, who often watched the bird, is nearly sure that the steamer moves its wings alternately, instead of both together, as in other birds. These clumsy logger-headed ducks make such a noise and splashing, that the effect is exceedingly curious. It is able to dive only a very short distance. It feeds entirely on shell-fish from the kelp and tidal rocks; and hence its beak and head, which it uses for the purpose of breaking them, are so surprisingly heavy and strong, that they can scarcely be fractured with a hammer.

Another remarkable inhabitant of the southern hemisphere is the Rock Goose, (_Anas antarctica_,) which exclusively inhabits rocky shores, and is often met with on the Falkland Islands, and on the west coast of America, as far north as Chili. In the deep and retired channels of Tierra del Fuego, the snow-white gander, invariably accompanied by his darker consort, and standing close by each other on some distant rocky point, is a common feature in the landscape.

[Illustration: Red-Breasted Merganser.]

The Mergansers differ chiefly from the sea-ducks, whom they otherwise closely resemble both in outward form and mode of life, by their comparatively long and slender bill, furnished with serrated edges and hooked at the extremity. All the British species are adorned with crests, or a tuft of long feathers, at the back of the head. The red-breasted merganser is a beautiful bird, painted with a variety of gay colours. "The head and throat are of a rich shining green, the neck white, except a narrow dark line behind; at either side before the wings are numerous large white feathers bordered by velvet-black; the lower part of the neck and breast is chestnut-brown, varied with dark streaks, and the body and wings are elegantly diversified with white, black, and brown feathers." (Harvey, _Sea Side Book_.)

The family of the Grebes and Divers approximates the duck tribe in the order of creation, but is distinguished by a long conical bill, and the position of the legs, which are placed so far back towards the tail, that when the bird leaves the water it is obliged to stand nearly erect to preserve its equilibrium. The foot in the grebes is only

## partially webbed, the toes being merely lobed or finned; but the divers

are completely web-footed, like the duck. These latter do honour to their name, being most expert and indefatigable divers, remaining down sometimes for several minutes, and swimming rapidly under the water. The Red-throated Diver preys much on the fish entangled in the nets, but is often caught himself in his rapid pursuit of the fish; thus affording a strange example of a bird caught under water.

[Illustration: Great Crested Grebe.]

The Arctic Diver enjoys among the Norwegians the reputation of being a most excellent weather-prophet. When the skies are big with rain, the birds fly wildly about, and make the most horrible hoarse noise, fearing that the swelled waters should invade their nest; on the contrary, in fine weather, their note is different, and seemingly in an exulting strain. For this reason, the Norwegians, who, being mostly a maritime population, pay the greatest attention to the aspect of the sky, think it impious to destroy, or even to disturb, this species.

The family of _Alcadæ_, comprising the Guillemots, Auks, Razor Bills, and Puffins, is in form of body very similar to the Divers: the legs, which are short and thick, are inserted very far back, and give a still more erect carriage to the bird when on shore. The wings are short and small in proportion to the bulk of the body, and in the (now probably extinct) Great Auk, so much so as to be unfitted for flight. The Auks are strictly sea-birds, and nestle on its borders, breeding in caverns and rocky cliffs, and laying only one large egg. They obtain their food by diving, at which they are very expert. They are of social habits, and congregate in vast flocks on the rocky islets and head-lands of the northern coasts. At the head of the Magdalen Bay, on Spitzbergen, for instance, there is a high pyramidal mountain of granite, termed Rotge Hill, from the myriads of small birds of that name (Little Auk, _Alca alce_), which frequent its base, and which appear to prefer its environs to every other part of the harbour. They are so numerous that Admiral Beechey frequently saw an uninterrupted line of them extending full half-way over the bay, or to a distance of more than three miles, and so close together that thirty fell at one shot. This living column, on an average, might have been about six yards broad, and as many deep; so that allowing sixteen birds to a cubic yard, there must have been nearly four millions of birds on the wing at one time.

The calling or crying of the rotges amongst one another sounds at a distance as if you heard a great many women scolding together; so that the noise of millions uniting in a chorus must be terrific. On a fine summer's day, when a glorious sunshine gilds the snow peaks and glaciers of Spitzbergen, the merry cry of the little auk unites with that of the willocks, divers, cormorants, gulls, and other aquatic birds; and everywhere groups of walruses, basking in the sun, mingle their playful roar with the husky bark of the seal. It is pleasant to reflect that in those arctic wilds, uninhabitable by man, there are still millions of creatures enjoying life, all owing their support to the inexhaustible "garners" of the deep.

In the Penguins of the southern hemisphere, the shortness of wing and aptitude for swimming and diving are still more conspicuous than in the auks of the northern regions. In the water, the penguin makes use of its small featherless wing-stumps as paddles; on land, as fore feet, with whose help it scales so rapidly the grass-grown cliffs, as to be easily mistaken for a quadruped. When at sea, and fishing, it comes to the surface for the purpose of breathing, with such a spring, and dives again so instantaneously, that at first sight no one can be sure that it is not a fish leaping for sport. Other sea-birds generally keep part of their body out of the water while swimming; but this is not the case with the penguin, whose head alone appears upon the surface; and thus it swims with such rapidity and perseverance, as almost to defy many of the fishes to equal it. How much it feels itself at home on the waters, may be inferred from the fact that Sir James Ross once saw two penguins paddling away a thousand miles from the nearest land.

[Illustration: Antarctic Penguin.]

On many uninhabited islands in the higher latitudes of the southern hemisphere, this strange bird is met with in incredible numbers. On Possession Island, for instance, a desolate rock discovered by Sir James Ross in lat. 71° 56′, not the smallest appearance of vegetation could be found; but inconceivable myriads of penguins completely and densely covered the whole surface of the island, along the ledges of the precipices, and even to the summits of the hills, attacking vigorously the sailors as they waded through their ranks, and pecking at them with their sharp beaks, disputing possession, which, together with their loud coarse notes, and the insupportable stench from the deep bed of guano which had been forming for ages, made them glad to get away again. Sir James took possession of the island in the name of Queen Victoria; but unfortunately its treasures of manure are hidden beyond a far too formidable barrier of ice ever to be available to man.

[Illustration: Penguin.]

Duperrey ("Voyage de la Coquille,") found the Falklands swarming with penguins. In summer and autumn these strange birds leave their burrows early in the morning, and launch into the sea for fishing. After having filled their capacious stomachs, they waddle on shore, and remain for a time congregated on the strand, raising a dreadful clamour; after which they retire to enjoy a noon-tide sleep among the high tussack grass or in their burrows. In the afternoon the fishing recommences. Lesson says that about sunset on fine summer evenings, which unfortunately are but of rare occurrence on those foggy, storm-visited islands, all the penguins together raise their discordant voices, so that at a distance the noise might be mistaken for the hoarse murmur of a great popular assembly. As soon as the young are sufficiently strong, the whole band leaves the island, departing no one knows whither, though the mariners frequenting those seas believe that they spend the winter on the ocean. This opinion seems to be corroborated by the observations of Sir James Ross, who, on the 4th of December, in 49° S. lat., met on the high sea a troop of penguins that were doubtless on the way to their breeding place. He admired the astonishing instinct of these creatures, half fish, half bird, which leads them hundreds of miles through the pathless ocean to their accustomed summer abodes.

It may be imagined how the neighbouring seas must abound with fish, to be able to nourish such multitudes of penguins, whose stomach is capable of holding more than two pounds, and whose voracity is so great that they are often obliged to disgorge their superabundant meal. The elongated stomach reaches to the lower part of the abdomen, and the whole length of the intestinal canal is twenty-five feet, fifteen times longer than the body, so that nature has evidently provided for a most vigorous appetite, whetted by sea-bathing and sea air.

There are several species of penguins. The largest (_Aptenodytes antarctica_) weighs about eighty pounds. It is a rare bird, generally found singly, while the smaller species always associate in vast numbers. In 77° S. lat., Sir James Ross caught three of these giant penguins, the smallest of which weighed fifty-seven pounds. In the stomach of one of them he found ten pounds of quartz, granite, and trap fragments, swallowed most likely to promote digestion.

The penguin, like his northern representative the auk, lays but one single egg. His not unsavoury flesh is black. Besides his dense plumage, he is protected against the cold of the higher latitudes by a thick cover of fat under his skin.

Humboldt's penguin (_Spheniscus Humb._) is frequently found in the Bay of Callao. This bird is a little smaller than the common grey penguin, with a somewhat differently coloured back and breast. The Peruvians call it _pajaro niño_, "little darling bird," and keep it in their houses; it is very easily tamed, gets very familiar, and follows its master like a dog. The sight of the fat creature, awkwardly waddling about the streets on its short feet, and violently agitating its wing-stumps to maintain its equilibrium, is inexpressibly grotesque. Tschudi kept one of these tame penguins, which punctually obeyed his call. At dinner it regularly stood like a stiff footman behind his chair, and at night slept under his bed. When "Pepe" wanted a bath, he went into the kitchen and kept striking with his beak against an earthen jar, until some one came to pour water over him.

[Illustration: Common Pelican.]

To the pelican tribe, which is generally distinguished by a surface of naked skin about the throat, capable of considerable dilatation, and serving as a pouch for the reception of unswallowed food, belong among others the Cormorant (_Phalacrocorax_), the Frigate-Bird (_Tachypetes aquila_), and the Gannet (_Sula bassana_), or Solan goose. All these birds are of much more active habits than the last named family, with bodies of more shapely form, more ample wings, and a stronger flight.

The common cormorant with his long bill, bent at the point, and furnished with a nail, his black livery, and yellowish chin-pouch, is a most disagreeable comrade. His smell, when alive, is more rank and offensive than that of any other bird, and his flesh is so disgusting, that it turns the stomach even of an Esquimaux. In spite of his voracity, he always remains thin and meagre, the picture of a hungry parasite. But fishing he understands remarkably well, and formerly used to be trained for this purpose in England, in the same manner as a nearly related species is to the present day employed in China. Mr. Fortune thus describes this original chase, which he witnessed on the Yellow River:--"There were two boats, each containing one man, and about ten or twelve birds. The latter stood perched on the sides of the boats, and seemed to have just arrived upon the scene of action. Their masters now commanded them to leave the boats; and so excellent was their training, that they instantly obeyed, scattered themselves over the canal, and began to look for prey. They have a splendid sea-green eye, and quick as lightning they see and dive upon the finny tribe, which, once caught in the sharp notched bill, finds escape impossible. As soon as a cormorant rises to the surface with his prey in his bill, his master calls him, when, docile as a dog, he swims to the boat and surrenders the fish, after which he again resumes his labours. And what is more wonderful still, when one of them has got hold of a fish so large as to be with difficulty dragged to the boat, the others come to his assistance, and by their united strength overpower the sprawling giant. Sometimes when a cormorant is lazy or playful, and seems to forget his business, the Chinaman strikes the water with a long bamboo near to the dreamer, and calls out to him in an angry tone. Immediately the bird, like a schoolboy caught nodding over his lesson, gives up his play, and returns to his duty. A small string is tied round the neck of the birds, for fear they might be tempted to swallow the fish themselves."

[Illustration: Common Cormorant.]

[Illustration: Frigate-Bird.]

The frigate-bird hovers over the tropical waters. Its singularly easy and graceful flight affords all the charm of variety. Sometimes it is seen balanced in mid air, its wings spread, but apparently motionless, its long forked tail expanding and closing with a quick alternate motion, and its head turned inquisitively downwards; sometimes it wheels rapidly, and darts to the surface of the water in pursuit of prey; and then again it soars so as to be lost to vision, its elevation alone being sufficient to distinguish it from all other sea birds. Sometimes it is seen 400 leagues from land; and yet it is said to return every night to its solitary roost. Its expanded pinions measure from end to end fourteen feet, a prodigious extent of wings, equalling or even surpassing that of the condor, the lordly bird of the loftiest Andes. Being unable to swim or dive, it seizes the flying-fish, that, springing out of the water to avoid the jaws of the bonito, often falls a prey to the frigate-bird, or else it compels boobies or tropic birds to disgorge. On volcanic coasts it builds its nest in the crevices of the high cliffs, and on the low coral islands in the loftiest trees. In the Paumotu Group, Captain Wilkes saw whole groves covered with the nests of the frigate-bird. When the old birds flew away, they puffed up their red pouches to the size of a child's head, so that it looked as if a large bladder full of blood was attached to their neck.

[Illustration: Flying Fish.]

[Illustration: Common Gannet.]

The Gannet or Soland-goose (_Sula Bassana_) haunts the Bass Island, a high steep rock in the Frith of Forth, whose black precipices are painted with dazzling stripes of white _guano_, the product of the inconceivable number of birds which settle upon the weather-beaten ledges. The gannets incubate in the turf of the slopes above, and you may sit down by them and their great downy young while their mates hover over you with discordant screams and almost touch you with their outspread pinions. There is but one landing-place, and this sole entrance to the natural fastness is closed by a barred gate, proclaiming that man has taken possession of the rock. Some years ago it was let at an annual rent of thirty-five pounds. The eggs are not collected, and no old bird is allowed to be shot, under a penalty of five pounds; only the young birds are persecuted. The chase begins on the 1st of August. They are taken with the hand or knocked on the head with sticks, and sent to the Edinburgh market, where they fetch about half a crown a piece. The gannet breeds also on Lundy Island, in the Severn, on Ailsa, on the coast of Ayrshire, on the island of St. Kilda, and hardly anywhere else in Europe. As it must let itself fall before taking wing, it requires a steep and precipitous breeding-station. Its mode of fishing is particularly graceful. Rapidly skimming the surface of the sea, as soon as it spies a fish swimming below, it rises perpendicularly over the spot, and then, suddenly folding its wings, drops head-foremost on its prey swifter than an arrow, and with almost unerring aim. The prevalent colour of the full-plumaged bird is white, the tips of its wings only being black, and some black lines about the face, resembling eyebrows or spectacles. The pale yellow eyes are encircled with a naked skin of fine blue, the head and neck are buff colour, the legs black, and greenish on the fore part. The plumage of the young bird is very different, being blackish, dotted irregularly with small white specks.

The family of the Laridæ, which comprises the gulls, the sea-swallows, the petrels, and the albatrosses, is widely spread over the whole surface of the ocean. All the birds of this tribe have a powerful flight, and are distinguished by the easy grace of their motions, striking the air at long intervals with their wings, and generally gliding or soaring with outstretched pinions. Their form is handsome and well-proportioned, some of them resembling the swallow, others the dove; but their mode of life does not correspond with their beauty, as they are all ill-famed for their predatory habits and insatiable voracity. The cry of the sea-mew is peculiar, being a mixture of screaming and laughing. When in the solitude of a wild rocky coast it is heard mingling with the hoarse rolling of the surge and the moaning wind, it harmonises well with the character of the dreary scene, and produces a not unpleasing effect. It is amusing to witness the movements of the sea-mews at the mouths of the larger rivers, where they are seen in numbers, picking up the animal substances which are cast on shore, or come floating down with the ebbing tide. Such as are near the breakers will mount up the surface of the water, and run splashing towards the crest of the wave, to get hold of the object of their pursuit, while others are seen every now and then diving, and reappearing with a fish in their bill. Sometimes the more powerful sea-hawk interrupts their pleasure, pounces upon the robbers, and scatters the screaming band.

Many different species of gulls inhabit the northern shores, and various are the places which they choose for breeding. The Kittiwake or Tarrock (_Larus tridactylus_), one of the commonest sea-birds in Greenland, Iceland, the Feroës and the Scotch islands, builds its sea-weed nest on the highest and most inaccessible rocks. According to Faber (Prodromus of Icelandic Ornithology), its swarms are so numerous on Grimsoe, that they darken the sun when they fly, deafen the ear when they scream, and deck the green-capped rocks with a white covering when they breed.

[Illustration: Herring Gull (Young).]

In the famous "bird-city" at the north point of Sylt, the Silvery or Herring-gull plays a prominent part. Its great size, equal to that of the raven, but with much longer wings--its agreeable form, its pure white plumage, of metallic brilliancy on the back, gradually melting into light ash-blue; the velvet-black ends of the wings, with snowy feather tips, the lovely yellow eye, and the deep yellow beak, with its coral-red spot, all this together forms a beautiful picture. "There we stood," says Naumann, "surrounded by thousands, that partly hovered close over our heads, uttering their shrill screams, partly stood before us in pairs; some on their nests, the males keeping guard, some sleeping on one leg, and others leisurely stretching themselves. In one word, one hardly knew what most to admire, the uncommon cleanliness and beauty of their plumage, the great variety and elegance of their attitudes, their tameness, or the immense numbers collected in so small a space."

[Illustration: Herring Gull, or Silvery Gull (Adult).]

In the same "bird-city," but apart from the former, breed also the Common Gull (_Larus canus_) which is much smaller and of a more slender shape, and also the Sandwich and Caspian Terns. It is astonishing to see how each kind of sea-bird seeks its particular spot for breeding; only the auks and guillemots herd promiscuously. What may induce the birds to meet in such large bodies and then always to choose some particular cliff? The gulls yield the fortunate possessor of their district an annual income of at least two hundred rix-dollars. More than thirty thousand of the eggs, which are larger than those of the turkey, are collected every year, packed up with moss in baskets, and sent to the market. Two or three persons are busy from morning till evening, during the whole season, collecting the eggs, and receive for their trouble those of the smaller birds, which may also amount to about twenty thousand. But although the terns appear in considerable numbers on Sylt, they have chosen the small flat island, Norder Oog, to the west of Pelworm, for their chief residence. The breeding colony of the Sandwich tern amounts here to at least a million of individuals, so that when the birds are at rest, the island, at the distance of a mile, resembles a white stripe in the sea; but when their innumerable multitudes hover above it, they seem an immense white rotatory cloud. The eggs lie in some places so close together, that it is almost impossible to walk between them without treading upon them; the breeding birds often touch one another, and would not find room, if, like all sea-swallows that breed socially on the coast, they did not sit in the same posture, with their head facing the water. It is incomprehensible how each bird can find its eggs; it would even seem impossible, did we not know the miracles of animal instinct. Their noise is incessant, for even during the night they keep up a continual and lively prattle. He who approaches them during the day is soon surrounded by these screamers, whose whirling thousand-tongued multitudes stun his senses; and these birds, at other times so shy, flutter so close over his head, as often to touch him with their wings.

On Nowaja Semlja's ice-bound coast, on the peaks of isolated cliffs, and suffering no other bird in his vicinity, dwells the fierce imperious Burgomaster (_Larus glaucus_). None of its class dares dispute the authority of the lordly bird, when with unhesitating superiority it descends on its prey, though in the possession of another. Although not numerous, yet it is the general attendant on the whale-fisher whenever spoils are to be obtained. Then it hovers over the scene of action, and having marked out its morsel, descends upon it and carries it off on the wing. On its descent, the most dainty pieces must be relinquished, though in the grasp of fulmar, snow-bird, or kittiwake.

The larger parasitical or raptorial gulls (_Lestris parasiticus, catarrhactes_), are incapable of diving or plunging, their feathers being too large in proportion to their bulk. They are therefore obliged to live by the exertions of the lesser species, making them disgorge what they have eaten, and dexterously catching the rejected fish before it reaches the water. Thus we see the old feudal relations of baron and serf established as a natural institution among the gull-tribe.

[Illustration: Broad-billed Petrel.]

Although the sea-swallows and sea-mews are endowed with great power of wing, yet the petrels and albatrosses alone deserve the name of oceanic birds, as they are almost always found on the high seas, at every distance from land, and only during breeding-time seek the solitary coasts and islands. Petrels are scattered over the whole extent of the ocean, but the petrels which inhabit the northern seas are different from those of the antarctic ocean, and between both are other species, that never forsake the intertropical waters.

[Illustration: Fork-tailed Petrel.]

The Fulmar (_Procellaria glacialis_) is at home in the high north. As soon as the whale-fisher has passed the Shetland Islands, on his way to the Arctic Seas, this bird is sure to accompany his track, eagerly watching for anything thrown overboard. Walking awkwardly on land, the fulmar flies to windward in the most terrific storms. Many thousands frequently accumulate round a dead whale, rushing in from all quarters. The sea immediately about the ship's stern, when the men are engaged in skinning their gigantic prey, is sometimes so completely covered with them that a stone can scarcely be thrown overboard without striking one of them. When anything is thus cast among the crowd, those nearest take alarm, and so on, till a thousand are put in motion; but as in rising they strike the water with their feet, a loud and most irregular splashing is produced. It is amusing to observe with what jealousy they view, and with what boldness they attack, any of their species engaged in devouring the finest morsels, and to hear the curious chuckling noise they make in their anxiety for despatch, lest they should be disturbed. The voracious birds are frequently so glutted as to be unable to fly, in which case they rest upon the water until the advancement of digestion restores their wonted powers. They then return to the banquet with the same gusto as before, and although numbers of the species may have been killed with boat-hooks, and float among them, the others, nothing daunted, and unconscious of danger to themselves, continue their gormandising labours. When carrion is scarce, the fulmars follow the living whale, as if they had a presentiment of his future fate, and sometimes, by their peculiar motions while hovering on the surface of the water, point out to the fisherman the position of the animal. As their beak cannot make an impression on the dead whale until some more powerful creature tears away the skin, it may be imagined how delighted they are when man takes upon himself the trouble of peeling a whale for them.

The Glacial Petrel (_Procellaria gelida_) does not seem to approach the pole so near as the fulmar. He appears but seldom in Iceland, but breeds frequently in Newfoundland. The same is the case with the Shearwater (_P. puffinus_), which breeds in great numbers on the Feroë islands, and in Orcadia. The tropical petrels are the least known. They do not appear to gather troopwise, and but seldom follow ships. Towards 45° S. lat. the first Pintados (_P. capensis_) make their appearance, and are more rarely seen after having passed 60° S. lat. The Giant Petrel (_P. gigantea_), extends its flight as far as the ice-banks of the south, where the Antarctic and the Snowy (_P. antarctica et nivea_) Petrels first appear, birds which never leave those dreary seas, and are often seen in vast flocks floating upon the drift ice. Thus nature has set bounds to petrels, as to all other creatures that swim or fly in and over the ocean, and has divided the wide deserts of the sea among their different species. Who can tell us the mysterious laws which assign to each of them its limits? Who can show us the invisible barriers they are not allowed to pass?

[Illustration: Stormy Petrel.]

The Stormy Petrel (_P. pelagica_) seems to belong to every sea. It is about the size of a swallow, and in its general appearance and flight is not unlike that bird. Although the smallest web-footed bird known, it braves the utmost fury of the tempest, often skimming with incredible velocity the trough of the waves, and sometimes gliding rapidly over their snowy crests. Like all of its kind, it lives almost constantly at sea, and seeks during the breeding season some lonely rock, where it deposits in some fissure or crevice its solitary egg.

The mode of life of the petrels corresponds but little with their external beauty; they are in fact the crows of the ocean, and live upon the dead animal substances floating on its surface. Wherever the carcase of a whale, borne along by the current, covers the sea with a long stripe of putrid oil, they are seen feasting in the polluted waters. All petrels have the remarkable faculty of spouting oil of a very offensive smell, from their nostrils when alarmed, and this apparently as a means of defence.

The Albatross (_Diomedea exulans_) is the monarch of the high seas; the picture of a hero, who, under every storm of adverse fortune, preserves the immoveable constancy of an undaunted heart. Proud and majestic, he swims along in his own native element, and without ever touching the water with his pinions, rises with the rising billow, and falls with the falling wave. It is truly wonderful how he bids defiance to the fury of the unshackled elements, and how quietly he faces the gale. "He seems quite at home," say the sailors; and indeed this expression is perfectly characteristic of his graceful ease as he hovers over the agitated ocean.

[Illustration: Wandering Albatross.]

The albatross exceeds the swan in size, attains a weight of from 12lbs. to 28lbs., and extends his wings from ten to thirteen feet. His plumage is white and black, harmonising with the wave-crest and the storm-cloud. For weeks and months together he is seen to follow the course of a ship; but, according to Mr. Harvey (Sea Side Book), "the time he can remain on the wing seems to have been much exaggerated, for although, like the gull and the petrel, he is no diving-bird, he swims with the greatest ease; and notwithstanding the enormous length of his pinions, knows well how to rise again into the air. He is indeed unable to take wing from a narrow deck, but when he wishes to rise from the sea, he runs along flapping the waters until he has acquired the necessary impetus, or meets with a wave of a sufficient height, from whose lofty crest he starts as from a rocky pinnacle, and resumes his extensive flight over an immense expanse of ocean." A short-winged species frequents the waters of Kamtschatka and Japan; but the _wandering_ albatross (_D. exulans_) belongs more

## particularly to the southern hemisphere, being rarely seen to the north

of 30° S. lat., and appearing more frequently as the higher latitudes are approached. The regions of storms--the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Horn--are his favourite resorts, and all travellers know that the southern point of Africa is not far distant as soon as the albatrosses show themselves in larger numbers. These birds are the vultures of the ocean; their crooked sharp-edged beak is better adapted to lacerate a lifeless prey, than to seize upon the rapid fish as it darts swiftly along below the surface of the waters. From a vast distance they smell the floating carcase of a whale, and soon alight in considerable numbers upon the giant carrion. They also feed upon the large cephalopods that inhabit mid-ocean, and remains of these molluscs are generally found in their stomach. The Auckland and Campbell islands seem to be two of their favourite breeding-stations. When Sir James Ross visited these secluded groups, the birds were so assiduously breeding as to allow themselves to be taken with the hand. The nest is built of sand mixed with dried leaves and grasses, generally eighteen inches high, with a diameter of twenty-seven inches at the surface, and of six feet at the base. While breeding, the snow-white head and neck of the bird project above the grasses, and betray it from afar. On endeavouring to drive it from its eggs it defends itself valiantly, snapping with its beak. Its greatest enemy is a fierce raptorial gull (_Lestris antarcticus_), which is always on the look-out, and, as soon as the albatross leaves the nest, shoots down upon it to steal the eggs.

Swift flies the albatross, but fancy travels with still more rapid wings through the realms of space, and leads us suddenly from the lone islands of the Pacific to the north of another hemisphere. Saint Kilda rises before us--a glorious sight when the last rays of the setting sun, as he slowly sinks upon the ocean, light up with dazzling splendour the towering cliffs of the island, which one might almost fancy to be some huge volcano newly emerged from the deep, or the impregnable bulwark of some enchanted land. St. Kilda, one of the most striking examples of the grandest rock-scenery, plunges on all sides perpendicularly into the sea, so that although six miles in circumference, it affords but one single landing-place, accessible only in fair weather. Four of the promontories are perforated, and as many large caverns are formed, through which the sea rolls its heaving billows. From the eastern extremity, which rises nearly perpendicularly to the height of 1380 feet, and is supposed to be the loftiest precipice in Britain, the view is of indescribable sublimity. Far below, the long heavy swell of the ocean is seen climbing up the dark rock, whose base is clothed with sheets of snow-white foam. In many places the naked rock disappears under the myriads of sea-birds sitting upon their nests; the air is literally clouded with them, and the water seems profusely dotted with the larger fowl, the smaller ones being nearly invisible on account of the distance. Every narrow ledge is thickly covered with kittiwakes, auks, and guillemots; all the grassy spots are tenanted by the fulmar, and honey-combed by myriads of puffins; while close to the water's edge on the wet rocks, which are hollowed out into deep recesses, sit clusters of cormorants, erect and motionless, like so many unclean spirits, guarding the entrance of some gloomy cave.

[Illustration: Black Guillemot.]

On rolling down a large stone from the summit, a strange scene of confusion ensues. Here, falling like a thunderbolt on some unfortunate fulmar sitting upon its nest, it crushes the poor creature in an instant; then rolling down the crags, and cutting deep furrows in the grassy slopes, it scatters in dismay the dense groups of auks and guillemots. Its progress all along is marked by the clouds of birds, which affrighted shoot out from the precipice to avoid the fate to which nevertheless many fall a prey, until at length it reaches the bottom along with its many victims. The scared tenants of the rock now return to their resting-places, and all is again comparatively quiet.

[Illustration: Common Puffin.]

Several species of gulls are of common occurrence on St. Kilda: _Larus marinus_, _fuscus_, _canus_, and _tridactylus_. The last, or kittiwake, is the most abundant; a social bird, choosing the most inaccessible spots. On disturbing a colony of kittiwakes, most of the birds leave their nests and fly about the intruder, uttering incessantly their clamorous but not unmusical cry. The noise from a large flock is almost deafening; the flapping of their wings and their loud screams, joined to the deep guttural notes of the passing gannets, and the shrill tones of the larger gulls, form a combination of sounds without a parallel in nature. Probably on account of its vigilance, the kittiwake is not pursued by the fowler.

The fulmar breeds in almost incredible numbers on St. Kilda (the only place in Britain where he is found), and is to the natives by far the most important production of their barren land. On the crest of the highest precipices, and only on such as are furnished with small grassy shelves, on every spot above a few inches in extent, the fulmars have taken possession of the rock. On being seized, they instantly disgorge a quantity of clear amber-coloured oil, which imparts to the whole bird, its nest and young, and even the very rock which it frequents, a peculiar and very disagreeable odour.

Fulmar oil is one of the most valuable productions of St. Kilda. The best is obtained from the old bird by surprising it at night upon the rock, and tightly closing the bill until the fowler has seized the bird between his knees with its head downwards. By opening the bill, the fulmar is allowed to eject about a table-spoonful, or rather more, of oil into the dried gullet or stomach of a solan-goose. The islanders use fulmar oil for their lamps, and consider it as an infallible remedy against chronic rheumatism.

It is chiefly in pursuit of the fulmar that the St. Kildian often endangers his life. Two of the fowlers generally proceed in company, each furnished with several coils of rope, about half an inch in diameter. One of them fastens one of the ropes under his arm-pits, and holding the extremity of another rope in one hand, is lowered down the cliff. His comrade stands a little away from the edge, holding the supporting rope firmly with both hands and letting it out very slowly, while he allows the other, or guide-rope, to slip out as is required from under one foot, which loosely secures it. On reaching a ledge occupied by birds, the fowler commences his operations, easily securing the eggs and young birds, and knocking down the old ones with a short stick, or catching them by a noose attached to a long slender rod. He then secures his sport by bundling the birds together, and tying them to a rope let down from above, depositing at the same time in a small basket the eggs he has gathered. The dexterity of these rocksmen is truly astonishing. The smallest spot is considered by them as a sufficiently secure standing-place, and they will creep on hands and knees, though cumbered with a load of birds, along a narrow ledge, seemingly without concern for their personal safety. When exhibiting before strangers, a precipice about six hundred feet high, overhanging the sea, at a short distance from the village, is generally chosen for a display of their agility. About midway they strike against the rock, and rebound twelve feet or more with all the agility of a tight-rope dancer.

The Gannet, or Solan-goose, which abounds in the north of Scotland and on the numberless islands and rocky fiords which line the Norwegian coast, likewise congregates in vast numbers about St. Kilda, from whence a portion of them take their departure every morning to fish for herrings, their favourite food, in the bays and channels of the other Hebrides, the nearest of which is about fifty miles distant. This bird is very select in the choice of its breeding-places, which it occupies to the total exclusion of every other species. None are to be found in Hirta, but the island of Borreray is almost entirely occupied with them, as are also the adjacent rocks, Stack Ly and Stack Narmin. These cliffs are remarkable for their pointed summits and towering height, and appear, even from the distance of many miles, as if they were covered with snow, the deceptive appearance being caused by the myriads of gannets with which the rock is thickly covered, as well as the dense clouds of these white-plumed birds passing and repassing in the neighbourhood of their nests. Petrels, shearwaters, puffins, guillemots, and auks, are also very abundant about the weather-beaten cliffs of St. Kilda.

[Illustration: Puffin.]

If we consider that similar bird-republics are to be found on almost every rocky coast or surf-beaten cliff of the northern seas, we must needs be astonished at the inexhaustible prodigality of Nature, which covers desolate rocks with such a profusion of life. The vast number of sea-birds is the more surprising, as many species, such as the guillemot, the auk, the fulmar, and the puffin, lay but one single egg on the naked rock, and often in so precarious a situation, that it is almost inconceivable how breeding can take place. When the birds are surprised and suddenly fly off, many of the eggs tumble down into the surf. Sea-eagles, falcons, and raptorial gulls destroy a great number, and pounce upon the young; thousands fall a prey to the rigours of an Arctic winter; the spring-tides sweeping over low shores, often carry away whole generations at once, and many a maritime population lives entirely upon the sea-fowl that breed upon the sterile soil. And yet, in spite of so many enemies and persecutions, their numbers remain undiminished, nor has their importance ever ceased in the domestic economy of the rude islanders of the north.

[Illustration: Auk.]

[Illustration: Sea-Fowl Shooting.]

But however valuable the eggs and the oil, the feathers and the flesh of the hyperborean bird-republics may be to man, they are far from equalling in importance the guano producing sea-fowl of the tropical seas. This inestimable manure, which has become so indispensable to the British agriculturist, is found scattered over numerous localities in the intertropical regions. It abounds on many of the rocky islets of the Red Sea, where the life-teeming waters afford sustenance to innumerable sea-gulls, cormorants, and pelicans; but its most widely celebrated stores cover the small Chincha Islands, not far from Pisco, about a hundred miles to the south of Callao, where they form enormous layers 50 or 60 feet deep.

The upper strata are of a greyish-brown colour, which lower down becomes darker; and in the inferior strata the colour is a rusty red, as if tinged by oxide of iron. The guano becomes progressively more and more compact from the surface downwards, a circumstance naturally accounted for by the gradual deposit of the strata and the increasing superincumbent weight. As is universally known, guano is formed of the excrements of different kinds of marine birds; but the species which Tschudi, the celebrated Peruvian traveller, more particularly enumerates are--_Larus modestus_ (Tschudi), _Rhynchops nigra_ (Linn.), _Plotus anhinga_ (Linn.), _Pelecanus thayus_ (Mol.), _Phalacrocorax Gaimardii_ and _albigula_ (Tsch.), and chiefly the _Sula variegata_ (Tsch.).

The immense flocks of these birds, as they fly along the coast, appear like aërial islands; and when their vast numbers, their extraordinary voracity, and the facility with which they procure their food are considered, we cannot be surprised at the magnitude of the beds of guano which have resulted from the uninterrupted accumulations of countless ages. During the first year of the deposit the strata are white, and the guano is then called _Guano blanco_. In the opinion of the Peruvian cultivators, this is the most efficacious kind. As soon as the dealers in guano begin to work one of the beds, the island on which it is formed is abandoned by the birds. It has also been remarked that, since the increase of trade and navigation, they have withdrawn from the islands in the neighbourhood of the ports. Under the empire of the Incas, the guano was regarded as an important branch of state economy. It was forbidden, on pain of death, to kill the young birds. Each island had its own inspector, and was assigned to a certain province. The whole distance between Arica and Chaucay, a length of two hundred nautical miles, was exclusively manured with guano. These wise provisions have been entirely forgotten by the Spaniards, but the Peruvians now begin to discover the error of their former masters, and look forward with anxiety to the period when the guano will no longer suffice for the wants of husbandry. At the present day they use it chiefly in the cultivation of maize and potatoes. A few weeks after the seeds begin to shoot, a little hole is made round each root and filled up with guano, which is afterwards covered with a layer of earth. After the lapse of twelve or fifteen hours, the whole field is laid under water, and left in that state for about half a day. Of the guano blanco a less quantity suffices, and the field must be more speedily and abundantly watered, otherwise the roots would be destroyed. The effect of this manure is incredibly rapid. In a few days the growth of the plant is doubled; if the manure is repeated a second time, but in smaller quantity, a rich harvest is certain;--at least the produce will be three times greater than that which would have been obtained from the unmanured soil. The uniformity of climate, along a coast where rain is _never_ known to fall, contributes essentially to the superior quality of the Chincha guano, as atmospherical precipitations naturally dissolve and wash away many of the most fertilising salts.

The consumption of guano in Western Europe, and particularly in England, increases with surprising rapidity. On the island of Iquique a layer thirty feet deep, and covering a space of 220,000 square feet, has been entirely removed within twenty-seven years. In the year 1854, 250,000 tons were dug in the Chincha Islands, and the actual annual exportation amounts to double the quantity. The digestive functions of the Sula and her companions thus bring in _larger_ sums to the Peruvian Government than all the silver mines of Cerro de Pasco, and the transport of the guano employs larger fleets than ever Spain possessed at the brightest period of her power.

"The Chincha Islands," says Castelnau (_Expédition dans les Parties Centrales de l'Amérique du Sud_; Paris, 1851), "are completely desert and devoid of vegetation; their granite soil is clearly distinguished by its colour from the thick stratum of guano with which it is covered, and the surface of which looks at a distance like snow. The steep banks render landing difficult, but facilitate at the same time the shipping of the produce, as the vessels lie at anchor close to the pits. Digging takes place at three places, close to one another, and the traveller has only to compare the enormous deposits with the smallness of the excavations, which at some distance are hardly perceptible, to convince himself of the inexhaustible supply. Some huts have been constructed on the island, where, in the midst of ammoniacal effluvia, some Peruvian customhouse officers and soldiers superintend the working of the guano-mines."

[Illustration: Birds of Passage.]

CHAP. XI.

THE REPTILES OF THE OCEAN.

The Saurians of the Past Seas.--The Anatomical Structure of the Turtles.--Their Size.--Their Visits to the Shores.--The Dangers that await their Young.--Turtles on the Brazilian Coast.--Prince Maximilian of Neuwied and the Turtle.--Conflicts of the Turtles with Wild Dogs and Tigers on the Coast of Java.--Turtle-catching on Ascension Island.--Tortoise-shell.--The Amblyrhynchus cristatus.--Marine Snakes.--The Great Sea-Snake.

There was a time when the reptiles were the monarchs of the sea, when the ocean swarmed with gigantic saurians, tyrants of the fishes, combining the swiftness of the dolphin with the rapacity of the crocodile. Had those monsters of the deep been endowed with human intelligence, they would most likely also, with human arrogance, have boasted of an eternal sway. For where in the whole ocean was the enemy that could cope with them? Did not all beings flee wherever they appeared? and did not the inexhaustible sea promise them an everlasting supply of food?

[Illustration: Ichthyosaurus.]

But in spite of their colossal power, the saurians, like all created beings, have been forced to succumb to time.

Centuries and centuries passed on, the sea and air gradually changed, the temperature of the elements no longer remained the same, and thus by degrees a new ocean and a new atmosphere were formed, uncongenial to the nature of those huge reptiles. Thus they have been effaced from the roll of living things, and some petrified remains alone bear testimony to their former existence.

The most powerful saurians of the present day--the crocodile the gavial and the alligator--have left to the dolphins, the sharks, and other monstrous or swiftly-swimming cetaceans and fishes the dominion of the seas, and now merely infest the rivers and swamps of the tropical zone. The lizards also have long since retired from the scene where they once abounded, and the ocean at present harbours no other reptiles in its bosom than turtles and sea-snakes.

Most of the animals belonging to this class are either dangerous or of a disgusting appearance. Few creatures are objects of such universal abhorrence as the crocodile--the very type of brutal cold-blooded ferocity; as the venomous snake--the emblem of perfidy and ingratitude; or as the loathsome, but innocent toad, to which, on account of its ugliness, noxious properties have been ascribed which the poor animal does not possess. The frogs, lizards, and turtles alone seem to have escaped this general detestation, either from their more active habits, or their well-known harmlessness, or their various utility to man.

The anatomy of the turtle offers many points of interest; its vertebræ, ribs, and breast-bone growing together so as to form a bony envelope round the whole animal. This harness is covered by the skin, which in its turn is bedecked with large scales, while all the muscles and other soft parts are enclosed in the inner cavity. Only the head, feet, and tail protrude through openings between the upper and under carapace, and these can, by the land tortoises at least, be withdrawn entirely under the former. This is the only protection which Nature has afforded these animals against their enemies, for they have neither swiftness of flight, nor any offensive weapon at their command. But as soon as anything suspicious approaches, they conceal themselves under their massive cover, and oppose to every attack by tooth or nail the passive resistance of an impenetrable shield. Most of their enemies find it, besides, no easy task to turn them on their back, as many species attain a very considerable weight, so that their mere bulk constitutes a good defence. It might be supposed that this protection could only avail for a short time, as the want of air must soon force the animal to stretch its head out of its hiding-place, and this indeed would be the case, if kind Nature had not taken her measures against this emergency, by giving the creature a _cold_ blood, so that it can remain a very long time without breathing; long enough, at least, to tire the patience of the most obstinate foe.

[Illustration: Skeleton of Tortoise.

A, superior maxilla; B, inferior maxilla; C, ossiculum auditus; D, os hyoides; E, cervical vertebræ; F, dorsal vertebræ; G, sacrum; H, caudal vertebræ; I, dorsal ribs; K, marginal scales; N, scapula; O, coracoid bone; P, os humeri; Q, radius; R, ulna; S, bones of the carpus; T, metacarpal bones; U, digital phalanges; V, pelvis; W, femur; X, tibia; Y, fibula; Z, tarsus; Æ, metatarsus; A.V., phalanges of the foot. ]

But how comes it, the reader may ask, that respiration, which pours a warm current through our veins, fails in raising the temperature of the turtle's blood?

Without entering into a lengthened description of the human heart, I shall merely observe that it consists of two halves (each half being again subdivided into two separate chambers), and that the right half, which receives venous blood and pours it into the lungs, is completely separated by a partition from the left half, which receives arterial or aërated blood from the lungs, and propels it into every part of the body. Thus the two different kinds of blood are completely separated, so that an _unmixed_ venous blood flows into the lungs, where it is converted by the oxygen of the air into arterial blood. But this connection, like most chemical processes, takes place under an evolution of heat, which is so considerable that our internal temperature constantly maintains itself at the height of 98° F.

[Illustration: Theoretic Representation of the Circulation in Mammals and Birds.]

[Illustration: Theoretic Representation of the Circulation in Reptiles.]

But the turtle's heart is differently formed, consisting, as the annexed theoretic representation shows, of but one ventricle and two auricles, so that a _mixed_, or only half aërated blood circulates throughout the body, which naturally produces a torpidity of the whole vital process. Besides, the lungs of the reptiles are incapable of aërating so great a quantity of blood as ours, as their cells are much larger, thus offering less surface to the action of the air; and finally, the ribs of the turtles being immovable, they are incapable of extending the lungs, so that the animal is absolutely obliged to swallow the necessary supply of air, and to pump it, as it were, into the lungs, by contracting the muscles of the throat. Thus we see that every precaution has been taken to reduce respiration to a low standard, and prevent the evolution of heat. With this indolence of its cold-blooded circulation, the whole nature of the animal is in harmony; the bluntness of its senses, its want of intelligence, its slow movements, and its long endurance of hunger, thirst, and want of air. It leads but a drowsy dream-like existence, and yet, we may be sure, it is far from unhappy, for all its functions and organs agree perfectly one with the other, and when concord reigns, enjoyment of some kind must exist.

The turtles are distinguished from the land tortoises particularly by their large and long fin-shaped feet, and also by a longer tail, which serves them as a rudder. They have no teeth, but the horny upper jaw closes over the lower like the lid of a box, thus serving them as excellent shears, either for crushing shells or dividing the tough fibres of the sea-grass.

[Illustration: Green Turtle.]

They are at home in all the warmer seas, but sometimes they are carried by oceanic streams far away from their accustomed haunts. Thus, in the year 1752, a Green turtle, six feet long, and weighing 900 pounds, stranded near Dieppe; and in 1778 another, seven feet long, on the coast of Languedoc. One taken on the coast of Cornwall in July, 1756, measured from the tip of the nose to the end of the shell, six feet nine inches, and the weight was supposed to be nearly 800 pounds. These few examples show us that the turtles rank among the larger inhabitants of the ocean, although they are far from attaining the fabulous proportions assigned to them by Pliny (who makes the Indians use their shells as boats or roofs), or the enormous size of some colossal extinct species, such as the fossil tortoise from the Siwala hills, preserved in the East Indian Museum, which measures twelve feet in length. They live almost constantly at sea, partly on shell-fish, like the fierce Loggerhead turtle (_Testudo Caretta_), partly on sea-grass, like the Green turtle (_T. Midas_), and only go on shore during the warmest months of the year, for the purpose of laying their eggs.

[Illustration: Loggerhead Turtle.]

"We followed the monotonous sea-coast," says Prince Maximilian of Neuwied, in his interesting "Travels through the Brazils;" "our two soldiers, a Negro and an Indian, frequently stopping to dig turtle-eggs out of the sand, which, boiled in sea-water, used to form our evening repast. Once, while they were busy gathering drift-wood for cooking, we found at a small distance from our fire an enormous turtle busy laying her eggs. We could not possibly have met with anything more agreeable; the creature seemed to have crawled there for the express purpose of providing for our supper. Our presence did not discompose her in the least; she allowed herself to be touched, and even raised from the ground, for which purpose four men were required. During our loud deliberations on her future fate, she gave no other sign of uneasiness than a blowing sound, and continued to work slowly with her hind fins, throwing up the earth at regular intervals.

"One of the soldiers stretched himself out at full length on the ground near the purveyor of our kitchen, inserted his arm into the earth-hole, and threw out the eggs as they were laid by the turtle. In this manner above a hundred were collected in about ten minutes. A council was now held as to the means of adding the beast to our collection, but as it would have required an additional mule for the transport, we gave it its life. These colossal turtles--Midas, Coriacea, and Caretta--especially choose these desert coasts for the laying of their eggs. They emerge from the sea in the dusk of evening, and then crawl back again into the water one or two hours after the setting of the sun. Thus also the friendly turtle, which had so abundantly provided for our wants, disappeared after a short time; we found the large hole filled up, and a broad trace in the sand showed that the animal had again retreated to its favourite element. The Midas is said to lay from ten to twelve dozen, and the Coriacea from eighteen to twenty dozen eggs at once."

The wild sand coast of Bantam (Java) is annually frequented by a large number of turtles. They are often obliged to creep over nearly a quarter of a mile of the beach, before finding at the foot of the sand-dunes a dry and loose soil fit for their purpose; and on this journey, which for them is a very long one, they have many dangers to encounter. Hundreds of their skeletons lie scattered about the strand, many of them five feet long, and three feet broad; some bleached and cleaned by time, others still half filled with putrid intestines, and others, again, quite fresh and bleeding. High in the air a number of birds of prey wheel about, scared by the traveller's approach. Here is the place where the turtles are attacked by the wild dogs. In packs of from twenty to fifty, the growling rabble assails the poor sea-animal at every accessible point, gnaws and tugs at the feet and at the head, and succeeds by united efforts in turning the huge creature upon its back. Then the abdominal scales are torn off, and the ravenous dogs hold a bloody meal on the flesh, intestines, and eggs of their defenceless prey. Sometimes, however, the turtle escapes their rage, and dragging its lacerating tormentors along with it, succeeds in regaining the friendly sea. Nor do the dogs always enjoy an undisturbed repast. Often during the night, the "lord of the wilderness," the royal tiger, bursts out of the forest, pauses for a moment, casts a glance over the strand, approaches slowly, and then with one bound, accompanied by a terrific roar, springs among the dogs, scattering the howling band like chaff before the wind. And now it is the tiger's turn to feast, but even he, though rarely, is sometimes disturbed by man. Thus, on this lonely, melancholy coast, wild dogs and tigers wage an unequal war with the inhabitants of the ocean.

The cold-blooded turtle is obliged to confide the hatching of her eggs to the sun, which generally accomplishes the task in three weeks. On creeping out of the egg, the young, even those of the largest species, are not larger than half-a-crown and of a white colour. Unprotected by a parent's tenderness, the poor little creatures seem only to be born for immediate death. Their first instinctive movements are towards the element for which they are destined; slowly they drag themselves towards the water, but the sea meets them with a rough embrace, and the unmerciful waves generally throw them back again upon the shore. Here they are attacked by great sea-birds, storks and herons, against which, in spite of their smallness, they make feeble efforts of defence, or by still more powerful beasts of prey; and thus the greater part of the unfortunate brood is destroyed at its very first entrance into life; while those which reach the sea, are generally devoured by sharks and other sharp-toothed fishes. It is therefore not in vain that the turtle lays four or five hundred eggs in the course of a single summer, for were she less fruitful, the race would long since have been extinguished.

I need hardly mention, that the flesh of the green turtle is everywhere esteemed as a first-rate delicacy. The king of the Manga Reva Islands in the South Sea keeps them in a pen for the wants of his table; and the London alderman is said to know no greater enjoyment than swallowing a basin of turtle soup. Hence it is no wonder that the mariner, tired of salt-beef and dried peas, persecutes them on all the coasts of the tropical seas, wherever solitude, a flat beach, and a favourable season promise to reward his trouble.

Bernardin de St. Pierre gives us the following picturesque description of turtle-catching on Ascension Island;--"Fire-wood, a kettle, and the great boat-sail were landed, and the sailors lay down to sleep, as the turtles do not emerge from the sea before night-fall. The moon rose above the horizon and illumined the solitude, but her light, which adds new charms to a friendly prospect, rendered this desolate scene more dreary still. We were at the foot of a black hillock, on whose summit mariners had planted a great cross. Before us lay the plain, covered with innumerable blocks of black lava, whose crests, whitened by the drippings of the sea-birds, glistened in the moonbeam. These pallid heads on dark bodies, some of which were upright, and others reclined, appeared to us like phantoms hovering over tombs. The greatest stillness reigned over this desolate earth, interrupted only from time to time by the breaking of a wave, or the shriek of a sea-bird. We went to the great bay to await the arrival of the turtles, and there we lay flat upon the sand in the deepest silence, as the least noise frightens the turtles, and causes them to withdraw. At last we saw three of them rising out of the water, and slowly creeping on shore, like black masses. We immediately ran up to the first, but our impatience caused it to drop immediately again into the sea, where it escaped our pursuit. The second, which had already advanced too far, was unable to retreat; we turned it on its back. In this way we caught about fifty turtles, some of which weighed five hundred pounds. Next morning, at ten, the boat came to fetch the produce of our nocturnal sport. This work occupied us the whole day, and in the evening the superfluous turtles were restored to the sea. If suffered to remain a long time on their back, their eyes become blood-red, and start out of their sockets. We found several on the strand that had been allowed to perish in this position, a cruel negligence, of which thoughtless sailors are but too often guilty."

In the sea, also, the turtles are pursued by man. In the clear West Indian waters, where they are frequently seen at great depths, feeding on the sea-grass meadows, divers plunge after them and raise them to the surface. Sometimes they are harpooned, or even caught sleeping on the waters.

The ancient Romans, who spent such extravagant sums upon dishes repugnant to our taste, seem to have had but little relish for turtle flesh, which otherwise the conquerors of the world might easily have obtained from the Red Sea; for though we read that Vitellius feasted upon the brains of pheasants, and the tongues of nightingales, it is nowhere mentioned, that he ever, like the Lord Mayor of London, set seven hundred tureens of turtle soup before his guests.

On the other hand, they made a very extensive use of tortoise-shell, the produce of the Hawk's-bill turtle (Testudo imbricata) a native both of the American and Asiatic seas, and sometimes, but more rarely, met with in the Mediterranean. The flesh of the animal is not held in any estimation as a food, but the plates of the shell being thicker, stronger, and cleaner than those of any other species, render it of great importance as an article of trade.

[Illustration: Hawk's-bill Turtle.]

"Carvilius Pollio," says Pliny, "a man of great invention in matters pertaining to luxury, was the first who cut the plates of the tortoise for veneering or inlaying." The Romans imported large quantities of this precious article from Egypt, and under the reign of Augustus, the wealthy patricians used even to inlay the doors and columns of their palaces with it. When Alexandria was taken by Julius Cæsar, the warehouses were so full of tortoise-shell that the conqueror proposed to make it the principal ornament of his triumph.

The use of tortoise-shell for the decoration of houses and furniture is long since out of fashion, but it is still in great request for the making of combs and boxes. By steeping it in boiling water it softens, and may then, by a strong pressure, be moulded into any form. When a considerable extent of surface is required, different pieces must be joined together. This is done by scraping thin the edges of the pieces to be united, and laying them over each other while they are in the heated and softened state; strong pressure being then applied, they become completely agglutinated. It is in this way that gold, silver, and other metals for different ornaments are made to adhere to tortoise-shell.

* * * * *

When, at the beginning of the chapter, I mentioned that the lizards had entirely forsaken the ocean, I forgot that the Galapagos Islands in the South Sea, right under the Equator, exclusively possess a maritime animal of this kind, which, from its being the sole existing representative, or dwindled descendant of the giant oceanic saurians of yore, is far too interesting to be passed unnoticed. This lizard is extremely common on all the islands throughout the Archipelago. It lives exclusively on the rocky sea-beaches, and is never found,--at least Mr. Darwin never saw one,--even ten yards inshore. It is a hideous-looking creature, of a dirty black colour, stupid and sluggish in its movements. The usual length of a full-grown one is about a yard, but there are some even four feet long. These lizards were occasionally seen some hundred yards from the shore, swimming about; and Captain Collnett, in his "Voyage," says they go out to sea in shoals to fish. With respect to the object, Mr. Darwin believes he is mistaken; but the fact, stated on such good authority, cannot be doubted. When in the water the animal swims with perfect ease and quickness by a serpentine movement of its body and flattened tail; the legs, during this time, being motionless and closely collapsed on its sides. A seaman of the "Beagle" sank one with a heavy weight attached to it, thinking thus to kill it directly; but when an hour afterwards he drew up the line the lizard was quite active. Their limbs and strong claws are admirably adapted for crawling over the rugged and fissured masses of lava, which every where form the coast. In such situations a group of six or seven of these hideous reptiles may oftentimes be seen on the black rocks, a few feet above the surf, basking in the sun with outstretched legs.

Mr. Darwin opened the stomach of several, and in each case found it largely distended with minced sea-weed, of a kind growing at the bottom of the sea, at some little distance from the coast. The nature of this lizard's food, as well as the structure of its tail, and the certain fact of its having been seen voluntarily swimming out at sea, absolutely prove its aquatic habits; yet there is in this respect one strange anomaly, namely, that when frightened it will not enter the water. From this cause it is easy to drive these lizards down to any little point overhanging the sea, where they will sooner allow a person to catch hold of their tail than jump into the water. They do not seem to have any notion of biting; but when much frightened they squirt a drop of fluid from each nostril. One day Mr. Darwin carried one to a deep pool left by the retiring tide, and threw it in several times as far as he was able. It invariably returned in a direct line to the spot where he stood. It swam near the bottom with a very graceful and rapid movement, and occasionally aided itself over the uneven ground with its feet. As soon as it arrived near the margin, but still being under water, it either tried to conceal itself in the tufts of sea-weed, or it entered some crevice. As soon as it thought the danger was past, it crawled out on the dry rocks and shuffled away as quickly as it could. Mr. Darwin several times caught this same lizard by driving it down to a point, and, though possessed of such perfect powers of diving and swimming, nothing could induce it to enter the water; and as often as he threw it in, it returned in the manner above described.

Perhaps this singular piece of apparent stupidity may be accounted for by the circumstance that this reptile has no enemy whatever on shore, whereas at sea it must often fall a prey to the numerous sharks. Hence, probably urged by a fixed and hereditary instinct that the shore is its place of safety, whatever the emergency may be, it there takes refuge. On a comparison of this singular animal with the true iguanas, the most striking and important discrepancy is in the form of the head. Instead of the long pointed narrow muzzle of those species, we have here a short obtusely truncated head, not so long as it is broad; the mouth consequently is capable of being opened to only a very small extent. From this circumstance, and from the crest on its head, it has received the Latin name of _Amblyrhynchus cristatus_.

* * * * *

The serpent race, which thrives so abundantly in the tropical forests and morasses, has also its marine representatives in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, where more than fifty species of Hydrophis, Pelamys, and Chersydra have been found. They are distinguished from their terrestrial relations by the flattened form of their tail, the planes of which being directed vertically give it the properties of a powerful oar, in striking the water by lateral oscillations. These sea-snakes always appear to prefer calms, swimming on the still surface in an undulating manner, never raising the head much from the surface, or vaulting out of the water. They dive with facility on the approach of danger, but do not appear to be particularly timid.

[Illustration: Water-Snake.]

The Pelamys bicolor is very common from India to Otaheite. In the seas of Mindoro and Sooloo, Mr. Adams saw thousands swimming on the top of the water, especially in eddies and tide-ways where the ripple collects numerous fish and medusæ, which principally constitute their prey. Their tongue is white and forked, differing in respect of its colour from the tongue of other snakes, which is generally black. The water-snakes, which are frequently beautifully banded, and as thick as a man's leg, are said to be highly venomous. Captain Cook, in one of his voyages, "saw abundance of water-snakes, one of which was coming up the side of our ship, and our men beat it off. The Spaniards affirm there is no cure for such as are bit by them; and one of our blacks happened to fall under that misfortune, and died notwithstanding the utmost care was taken by our surgeons to recover him."

Such are the _real_ sea-snakes as they are met with by ordinary travellers, while _the great sea-serpent_, which from time to time dives up in the columns of the newspapers, must, until better evidence be brought forward for its existence, be banished to those dim regions peopled by unicorns, griffins, krakens, and tailed men.

Olaus Magnus, it is true, speaks of the great sea-snake as if it made its daily appearance on the Norwegian coast. According to him, it inhabits the rocky caves near Bergen, and wanders forth at night, particularly by moonshine, to commit its depredations by sea and land; as calves and pigs seem to suit its appetite as well as fishes and lobsters. The body is covered with scales, a long mane flows along the neck, and the head, furnished with two glistening eyes, rises like a mast out of the water. It often attacks ships, and picks up seamen from the deck. This description may serve as an example of the boldness with which authors have sometimes asserted the most extravagant things.

The Greenland missionary Egede tells us in his Journal, that "on the 6th of July, 1734, there appeared a very large and frightful sea-monster, which raised itself so high out of the water that its head reached above our main-top. It had a long sharp snout, very broad flappers, and spouted water like a whale. The body seemed to be covered with scales, the skin was uneven and wrinkled, and the lower part was formed like a snake. After some time the creature plunged backwards into the water, and then turned its tail up above the surface, a whole ship-length from the head."

It is hard to disbelieve so pious and excellent a man, whose excited fancy no doubt gave extraordinary forms and dimensions to some commoner sea-animal of large size; but the testimony of a Scoresby, who during his frequent Arctic voyages never saw anything of the kind, would have been more convincing.

If to this account of Egede be added the reports of some other northern divines, such as Pontoppidan, the missionary Nicholas Græmius, and Maclean, who either pretend to have actually seen the monster or write about it from hearsay--and the testimony of a few seamen, among others of Captain M'Quhae of the Dædalus, who, on the 6th of August, 1848, saw a sea-snake on his homeward voyage from the East Indies; we have all the evidence extant in favour of the existence of the monstrous animal.

In opposition to these testimonies, incredulous naturalists beg to remark, that no museum possesses a single bone of the huge snake, and that its body has nowhere been found swimming on the ocean or cast ashore. They therefore agree with Professor Owen in regarding the negative evidence, from the utter absence of any recent remains, as stronger against their actual existence than the positive statements which have hitherto weighed with the public mind in favour of their reality; and believe that a larger body of evidence from eye-witnesses might be got together in proof of the reality of ghosts than in proof of the existence of the great sea-serpent.

The plain truth seems to be that lines of rolling porpoises, resembling a long string of buoys, first gave origin to the marvellous stories of the fabulous monster. For, keeping in close single file, and progressing rapidly along the calm surface of the water by a succession of leaps or demivaults forward, part only of their uncouth forms appears to the eye, so as to resemble the undulatory motions of one large serpentiform animal.

CHAP. XII.

THE MARINE FISHES.

General Observations on Fishes.--Their Locomotive Organs.--Tail.--Fins.--Classification of Fishes by Cuvier.--Air-Bladder.--Scales.--Beauty of the Tropical Fishes.--The Gills.--Terrestrial Voyages of the Anabas and the Hassar.--Examples of Parental Affection.--Organs of Sense.--Offensive Weapons of Fishes.--The Sea-Wolf.--The Shark.--The Saw-Fish.--The Sword-Fish.--The Torpedo.--The Star-Gazer.--The Angler.--The Chætodon Rostratus.--The Remora, used for catching Turtles.--Defensive Weapons of Fishes.--The Weever.--The Stickleback.--The Sun-Fish.--The Flying-Fish.--The numerous Enemies of the Fishes.--Importance and History of the Herring Fishery.--The Pilchard.--The Sprat.--The Anchovy.--The Cod.--The Sturgeons.--The Salmon.--The Tunny.--The Mackerel Family.--The Eel.--The Murey.--The Conger.--The Sand-Launce.--The Plectognaths.--The Sea-Horse.--The Pipe-Fish.--The Flat-Fishes.--The Rays.--The Fecundity of Fishes.

The bosom of the ocean is full of mysteries; it conceals a whole world of curiously-shaped animals, which the naturalist only superficially knows, and may, perhaps, never be able to fathom. To observe the habits of terrestrial animals, and accurately to determine their various species, is a comparatively easy task; but the denser element in which fishes live prevents us from following their motions with exactness, from studying their instincts, and from noting with fidelity their specific differences.

Since Pliny, who mentions but seventy-four different kinds of fishes, the number of known species has indeed enormously increased. The ancients, who knew only the waters of the Mediterranean and a very small part of the ocean, had no conception of the finny multitudes inhabiting the tropical and icy seas; but although modern science has succeeded in describing and picturing above eight thousand different kinds of fishes, yet there can be no doubt that many still unknown species dwell in the depths of ocean, or in the distant seas which are but seldom visited by the European mariner.

If the whole economy of the world of fishes were opened to our view, the magnificent picture would, no doubt, give us additional reasons for admiring the infinite wisdom of the Creator; but the little we do know suffices to convince us that the same wonderful harmony existing between the anatomical structure and the outward relations or mode of life in birds and mammiferous quadrupeds is also to be found in fishes, and that these creatures, though occupying a lower grade in Creation, are no less beautifully adapted to the peculiar element in which they are destined to live and move.

This strikes us at once in their external form, which, though subject to great variety, being sometimes spherical as in the globe-fish, or cubical as in the ostracion, or expanded as in the skate, or snake-like as in the eel, is generally that of an elongated oval, slightly compressed laterally, a shape which enables the fishes to traverse their native fluid with the greatest celerity and ease. We wisely endeavour to imitate this peculiar form in the construction of our ships, yet the rapidity with which the fastest clipper cleaves the waters is nothing to the velocity of an animal formed to reside in that element. The flight of an arrow is not more rapid than the darting of a tunny, a salmon, or a gilt-head through the water. It has been calculated that a salmon will glide over 86,400 feet in an hour, that it will advance more than a degree of the meridian of the earth in a day, and that it could easily make the tour of the world in some weeks, were it desirous of emulating the fame of a Cook or of a Magellan. Every part of the body seems exerted in this despatch; the fins, the tail, and the motion of the whole backbone assist progression; and it is to this admirable flexibility of body, which mocks the efforts of art, that fishes owe the astonishing rapidity of their movements.

Whales and dolphins move onwards by striking the water in a vertical direction, while fishes glide along by laterally curving and extending the spine. In some species, such as the eel, the whole body is flexible; but most of them paddle away with their tail to the right and left, and are thus driven forwards by the resistance of the water. Consequently the power of fishes is chiefly concentrated in the muscles bending the spine sideways, and generally we find these parts so much developed as to form the greatest part of the body.

[Illustration: Skeleton of the Perch.

A A, Dorsal Fins; B, Caudal; C, Anal; D, Ventral; E, Pectoral.]

The fins are the most important auxiliary organs of locomotion in fishes. The dorsal, caudal, and anal fins serve by their vertical position to increase the extent of the rowing surface, and to maintain the animal's balance, while the pectoral and ventral fins, which must be considered as the representatives of the fore and hind limbs of other vertebrata, are, moreover, of great assistance in directing its movements. With the help of these organs, fishes can advance or retrograde, ascend or descend in the water as they please, and it is curious to observe how, alternately extending or contracting one fin or the other, they gracefully plough the liquid element in every direction.

It is no less wonderful how perfectly the size and texture of the fins corresponds with the habits and necessities of the different species of fishes. Those which traverse vast portions of the ocean, or have frequently to struggle against swelling waves, are furnished with large and strong fins, while these organs are soft in the species which confine themselves to greater depths, where the winds cease to disturb the waters.

From the great variety which is met with both in the number and position of the fins, they are also of the greatest use in the classification of fishes, and afford the naturalist many of the chief characters which serve to distinguish the several orders, families, genera, and species of these aquatic vertebrates.[M]

[Footnote M: Cuvier divides the fishes into:

I. Chondropterygii--Skeleton cartilaginous; fins supported by cartilaginous rays; and

II. Osteopterygii--Skeleton composed of true bone.

The Chondropterygii are subdivided into three orders:

(_a_) Sturionidæ (sturgeons), with free gills.

(_b_) Selacii (rays, sharks), with gills fixed and a mouth formed for mastication.

(_c_) Cyclostomata (lamprey, myxine), with gills fixed and a mouth formed for suction.

The osseous fishes, which are far more numerous, are subdivided into six orders:

(_a_) Acanthopterygii; distinguished by the stiff spines which constitute the first fin-rays of the dorsal fin, or which support the anterior fin of the back in case there are two dorsals. In some cases the anterior dorsal fin is only represented by detached spines. The first rays of the anal fin are likewise spinous, as well as the first ray of the ventral fin. To this extensive order, which comprises about three-fourths of the osseous fishes, belong, among others, the families of the perches, gurnards, mackerels, mullets, breams, gobies, blennies, &c.

The three following orders of the osseous fishes have the rays that support the fins soft and composed of numerous pieces articulated with each other, with the exception in some cases of the first ray of the dorsal, or of the pectoral. Their leading character is afforded by the situation or absence of the ventral fin, which in the

(_b_) Malacopterygii abdominales are suspended beneath the abdomen, and behind the pectorals; in the

(_c_) Malacopterygii subbrachiales beneath the pectorals; and in the

(_d_) Malacopterygii apodes are totally wanting.

To the abdominal soft-rayed fishes belong the herring, salmon, pike, sly, and carp families; to the subbrachial, the cod family, the side-swimmers, and the lump fishes; and, finally, to the apodal malacopterygians, the single family of the anguilliform fishes. The small order of the

(_e_) Lophobranchi comprises the pipe-fishes, sea-horses, in whom the gills are not pectinated, as in the preceding subdivisions, but consist of little round tufts; and, finally, the

(_f_) Plectognathi--comprising the file, porcupine, and sun fishes--are distinguished by their maxillaries and premaxillaries being joined immovably to each other, so as to render the upper jaw incapable of protrusion. ]

Most fishes possess a remarkable accessory organ of locomotion in the air-bladder or swim-bladder which extends to a greater or smaller distance along the ventral surface of the spine, and enables them voluntarily to increase or diminish the specific gravity of their body. When they contract this remarkable gas-reservoir, or press out the included air by means of the abdominal muscles, the bulk of the body is diminished, its weight in proportion to the water is increased, and the fish swims easily at a greater depth. The contrary takes place on relaxing the tension of the abdominal muscles; and thus we see fishes rise and fall in their denser element by the application of the same physical law which is made use of by our aëronauts, to scale the heavens or to descend again upon the earth. Those fishes which are destined to live at the bottom of the sea or to conceal themselves in the mud, such as eels and skates, have either no air-bladder or a very small one--for economical Nature gives none of her creatures any organ that would be useless to them. Even the slimy glutinous matter which is secreted from the pores of most fishes, and lubricates their bodies, assists them in gliding through the waters, so that no means have been neglected to promote the rapidity of their movements.

The skin of fishes is but seldom naked; in most species it is covered with scales, that sometimes appear in the form of osseous plates, as in the ostracions, or project into formidable prickles, as in the porcupine-fish, but generally offer the aspect of thin laminæ, overlapping each other like the tiles of a roof, and embedded, like our nails, in furrows of the skin. In nearly all the existing fishes, the scales are flexible and generally either of a more or less circular form (_cycloid_), as in the salmon, herring, roach, &c., or provided with comb-like teeth projecting from the posterior margin (_ctenoid_), as in the sole, perch, pike, &c.; while the majority of fossil fishes were decked with hard bony scales, either rhomboidal in their form, of a highly polished surface, as in our sturgeons (_ganoid_), and arranged in regular rows, the posterior edges of each slightly overlapping the anterior ones of the next, so as to form a very complete defensive armour to the body; or irregular in their shape and separately imbedded in the skin (_placoid_), as in the sharks and rays of the present day.

[Illustration: Portion of Skin of Sole highly magnified.]

The scales of almost any fish afford admirable subjects for microscopic observation, but more particularly those of the ctenoid kind, which exhibit a brilliancy of reflected light, and a regularity of structure, such as no human mosaic could ever equal.

Many of our European fishes are richly decorated with vivid colours, but their scaly raiment is generally far from equalling the gorgeous magnificence of the fishes of the tropical seas.

If in the birds of the equatorial zone a part of the plumage sparkles with a gem-like brilliancy, all the colours of the rainbow combine to decorate the raiment of the tropical fishes, and no human art can reproduce the beauty of their metallic lustre, which at every movement in the crystalline waters exhibits to the enchanted eye new combinations and reflections of the most splendid tints.

The gaudiest fishes live among the coral reefs. In the tepid waters, where the zoophytes, those sensitive flowers of the ocean, build their submarine palaces, we find the brilliant Chetodons, the gorgeous Balistinæ, and the azure Glyphysodons gliding from coral branch to coral branch like the playful Colibris, that over the Brazilian fields dart from one lustrous petal to another.

Oxygen is as necessary to fishes and other marine creatures as it is to the terrestrial animals, but as they are obliged to draw it from a denser element, which absorbs but a small volume of air, their gills are necessarily differently constructed from the lungs of the creatures breathing in the atmosphere. In most species, comprising all the bony fishes, and the sturgeons, among those which have a cartilaginous skeleton, we find on either side of the throat five apertures, separated from each other by four crooked, parallel and unequal bones, and leading to a cavity, which is closed on the outside by an operculum or cover. In this cavity, and attached to the bones, are situated the delicate membranes, bearded like feathers, which serve to aërate the blood. The water constantly flows through the gills in one direction, entering by the branchial apertures of the throat, and emerging through the operculum. This is, in more than one respect, a most wise provision of Nature; for if the fishes were obliged to receive and reject the water by the same aperture, as we do the air, each expiration would evidently drive them backwards, and consequently retard their movements. It is also evident that the delicate fringes or folds of the gills would soon get into disorder if the water were carried through them in two opposite directions.

In most of the cartilaginous fishes, such as the sharks, rays, and lampreys, the gills are differently formed, the water not passing into a cavity closed by a cover, but flowing directly outwards through five (in the shark) or seven (in the lamprey) vents or spiracles. In these species also the gills are fixed, their margins being attached. Though the whole breathing apparatus of a fish is comprised in a small compass, its surface, if fully extended, would occupy a very considerable space; that of the common skate, for instance, being equal to the surface of the human body. This single fact may convince us of the numberless ramifications and convolutions of the gills, in which the water is elaborated and attenuated in the course of giving out its air; and how wonderfully Nature has contrived to effect her purpose with the greatest economy of space.

[Illustration: Theoretic representation of the Circulation in Fishes.]

Respiration is a species of combustion, and this must necessarily be very slow in an element which contains so small a portion of oxygen. No wonder that the circulation of the blood in fishes is equally tardy. Their heart, in comparison with _ours, is but half a one_, as it merely serves to force the venous blood into the gills--whence the aërated blood does not flow back to the heart as with us, to be rapidly and strongly propelled through the body, but proceeds immediately to the arteries. Evidently only a cold blood could be formed under such circumstances. It may seem strange that, when fishes are taken out of the water, they die from want of air; such, however, is the case. Their delicate breathing membranes collapse in the atmosphere, the blood can no longer flow as before into the innumerable small vessels with which they are interwoven, and, by rapidly drying in the air, they soon entirely lose the faculty of breathing. Thus those fishes whose gill-cover has a large aperture, die soonest in the air, while those where the opening is narrow, and more

## particularly those species where the gills communicate with a cellular

labyrinth containing water, which serves to keep them moist, are able to live a much longer time in the atmosphere.

[Illustration: The Anabas of the Dry Tanks.]

[Illustration: Frog-Fish.--(Cheironectes.)]

It is owing to such a moistening apparatus that _the climbing fishes_ (Anabas) live for days out of the water, and even creep up the trees at some distance from the shore, to catch the insects which serve them as food--a curious instance indeed of an animal seeking its nourishment in another element.

The Frog-fish of the Asiatic islands and the Southern hemisphere is not more remarkable for its hideous deformity than for its capacity of leading a terrestrial life. Not only can it live several days out of the water but it can crawl about the room in which it is confined, a facility which it owes to the great strength and the peculiar position of its pectoral fins, which thus perform the office of feet. The whole aspect of these grotesque-looking creatures, particularly in a walking position, is so much like that of toads or frogs, that a careless observer would at first be at some loss to determine their real nature.

A no less wonderful pedestrian is the Hassar (_Doras costata_), a South American fish, that marches over land in search of water, travelling a whole night when the pools dry up in which it commonly resides. It projects itself forwards on its bony pectoral fins, by the elastic spring of the tail, exerted sidewise, and in this manner proceeds nearly as fast as a man will leisurely walk. The strong scuta or bands which envelop its body must greatly facilitate its march, in the manner of the plates under the belly of serpents, which are raised and depressed by a voluntary power, in some measure performing the office of feet. The Indians say justly that these fishes supply themselves with water for their journey. If they find the pools and rivers everywhere dried up, they bury themselves in the mud, and fall into a kind of asphyxia or lethargy, till the rainy season recalls them again to life.

The hassar is also remarkable for a parental affection, almost unexampled among fishes. Sir Richard Schomburgk relates that it not only builds a complete nest for its spawn but also watches over it with the utmost vigilance till the young brood comes forth. In April, this marine artist begins to build his little dwelling of vegetable fibres, among the water-plants and rushes, until it resembles a hollow ball, flattened at the top. An aperture corresponding to the size of the mother leads into the interior. The parental affection of the fish is shamefully misused by man for its destruction. A small basket is held before the opening; then the nest is slightly beaten with a stick; and, furious, with extended fins, whose sharp points are able to inflict a painful wound, the poor hassar darts into the fatal basket.

[Illustration: SUBAQUEOUS LIFE--STICKLEBACKS AND NEST.]

SUBAQUEOUS LIFE--STICKLEBACKS AND NEST.

This plate represents a group of fifteen-spined sticklebacks busily employed in making their nests. To the left is seen a curious piece of marine architecture, mentioned by Mr. Couch, the well-known ichthyologist. A pair of sticklebacks had made their nest "in the loose end of a rope, from which the separated strands hung out about a yard from the surface, over a depth of four or five fathoms, and to which the materials could only have been brought, of course, in the mouth of the fish, from the distance of about thirty feet. They were formed of the usual aggregation of the finer sorts of green and red sea-weed, but they were so matted together in the hollow formed by the untwisted strands of the rope that the mass constituted an oblong ball of nearly the size of the fist, in which had been deposited the scattered assemblage of spawn, and which was bound into shape with a thread of animal substance, which was passed through and through in various directions, while the rope itself formed an outside covering to the whole."

The black Goby (_Gobius niger_) also prepares a nest for its eggs. This fish inhabits the slimy bottoms of the lagoons near Venice, and burrows galleries in the clayey soil, where it spends the greater part of the year, protected against storms and enemies. In spring it digs more superficial dwellings among the roots of the sea-grass, to which the spawn attaches itself. The architect watches over the entrance of the house, opposing sharp rows of teeth to every intruder.

A similar care may be admired in the tiny Stickleback, which the celebrated ichthyologist, M. Coste, has often watched building its nest. After the fish has collected the materials, it covers them with sand, glues the walls with a mucous secretion, and prepares a suitable entrance. At a later period it becomes the bold and indefatigable defender of its eggs, repelling with tooth and prickles all other sticklebacks that approach the nest. If the enemy is too powerful, it has recourse to artifice, darts forth, seems actively engaged in the pursuit of an imaginary prey, and often succeeds in diverting the aggressor's attention from its nest. The River Bullhead is likewise said to evince the same parental affection for its ova, as a bird for its nest, returning quickly to the spot, and being unwilling to quit it when disturbed. It is believed, also, of the Lump-Sucker, that the male first keeps watch over the deposited ova, and guards them from every foe with the utmost courage. If driven from the spot by man, he does not go far, but is continually looking back, and in a short time returns. Thus we find among the inferior animals glimpses of a higher nature, which prove that all created beings form a continuous chain, linked together by one all-pervading and almighty Power.

[Illustration: Internal Ear of Perch.]

[Illustration: Osseous labyrinth of the Human Ear.

_a_, Oval or vestibular fenestra; _b_, round or cochlear fenestra; _c_, external or horizontal semicircular canal; _d_, superior or anterior vertical semicircular canal; _e_, posterior or inferior vertical semicircular canal; _f_, the turns of cochlea.]

The senses of the fishes are also in perfect harmony with the peculiarities of their mode of life. Their eyes are indeed wanting in the fire and animation which gives so much expression to the physiognomy of the higher animals, but the structure of these organs is admirably calculated for the element in which they are plunged, as the spherical form and great size of the crystalline lens, by concentrating the rays of light, enables them to see with distinctness even through so dense a medium as that which surrounds them. When water is clear, smooth, and undisturbed the sight of fishes is very acute, a circumstance well known to anglers, who prefer a breeze undulating over the surface, as they can then approach much nearer the objects of their pursuit and practise their _artful dodges_ with a much better chance of success. The eyes in fishes are observed to occupy very different positions in different species, but their situation is always such as best to suit the exigencies of the particular fish. Thus in the star-gazer and sea-devil, that watch their prey from a muddy concealment, they are very appropriately placed at the top of the head, while in the flat-fishes, where an eye on the side habitually turned towards the ground would have been useless, the distorted head, by placing both eyes on the same level, affords them an extensive range of view in those various directions in which they may either endeavour to find suitable food or avoid dangerous enemies. That fishes are not deficient in the sense of hearing may be seen at once by the annexed illustrations, which show a marked similarity of organisation between the human ear and that of the perch. It is well known that they start at the report of a gun, though it is impossible for them to see the flash. Sir Joseph Banks used to collect his fishes by sounding a bell, and the Chinese call the gold-fish with a whistle to receive their food. In spite of their scaly covering, the fishes are not unprovided with organs of touch. The lips in many species are soft, and the mouths of others, such as the red mullet--for which such enormous sums were paid by the Roman epicures--are provided with barbules largely supplied with nerves, which no doubt enable them to distinguish the objects with which they come in contact. In the three elongated rays of their pectoral fins the gurnards may be said to possess fingers to compensate for their bony lips; and in many other fishes these modified arms or forefeet are applied as organs of feeling to ascertain the character of the bottom of the water. "You may witness the tactile action of the pectoral fins," says Professor Owen,[N] "when gold-fish are transferred to a strange vessel; their eyes are so placed as to prevent them seeing what is below them; so they compress their air-bladder, and allow themselves to sink near the bottom, which they sweep, as it were, by rapid and delicate vibrations of the pectoral fins, apparently ascertaining that no sharp stone or stick projects upwards, which might injure them in their rapid movements round their prison." Whether fishes possess any high degree of taste is a subject not easily proved; but, to judge by the large size of their olfactory nerves, their sense of smell is probably acute.

[Footnote N: "Lectures on Comparative Anatomy."]

[Illustration: Red Mullet.]

[Illustration: Gurnard.]

[Illustration: Wolf-Fish.--(Anarrhicas lupus.)]

The life of fishes is a state of perpetual warfare, a constant alternation of flight and pursuit. Prowling through the waters, they attack and devour every weaker being they meet, or dart away to escape a similar lot. Many of them are provided, besides their swiftness and muscular power, with the most formidable weapons. Thus the Sea-wolf has six rows of grinders in each jaw, excellently adapted for bruising the crabs and whelks, which this voracious animal grinds to pieces, and swallows along with the shells. When caught, it fastens with indiscriminate rage upon anything within its reach, fighting desperately, even when out of its own element, and inflicting severe wounds if not cautiously avoided. Schönfeld relates that it will seize on an anchor, and leave the marks of its teeth behind, and Steller informs us that one which he saw taken on the coast of Kamschatka frantically seized a cutlass with which it was attempted to be killed, and broke it in pieces as if it had been made of glass. No wonder that the fishermen, dreading its bite, endeavour as soon as possible to render it harmless by heavy blows upon the head. The great size of the monster, which in the British waters attains the length of six or seven feet, and in the colder and more extreme northern seas is said to become still larger, renders it one of the most formidable denizens of the ocean. It commonly frequents the deep parts of the sea, but approaches the coasts in spring to deposit its spawn among the marine plants. Fortunately for its more active neighbours, it swims but slowly, and glides along with the serpentine motion of the eel.

[Illustration: White Shark.]

Far more dreadful, from its gigantic size and power, is the White Shark (_Squalus carcharias_), whose jaws are likewise furnished with from three to six rows of strong, flat, triangular, sharp-pointed, and finely serrated teeth, which it can raise or depress at pleasure. This tyrant of the seas grows to a length of thirty feet, and its prodigious strength may be judged of from the fact that a young shark, only six feet in length, is able to break a man's leg by a stroke of its tail. Thus, when a shark is caught with a baited hook at sea, and drawn upon deck, the sailors' first act is to chop off its tail, to prevent the mischief otherwise to be apprehended from its enormous strength. An anecdote related by Hughes, the well-known and esteemed author of the "Natural History of Barbadoes," gives a good idea of the savage nature of this monster. "In the reign of Queen Anne a merchant-ship arrived at that island from England: some of the crew, ignorant of the danger of the recreation, were bathing in the sea, when a large shark appeared and swam directly towards them; being warned of their danger, however, they all hurried on board, where they arrived safe, except one poor fellow, who was bit in two by the shark, almost within reach of the oars. A comrade, and intimate friend of the unfortunate victim, when he observed the severed trunk of his companion, vowed his revenge. The voracious monster was seen traversing the bloody surface of the waves, in search of the remainder of his prey, when the brave youth plunged into the water. He held in his hand a long sharp-pointed knife; and the rapacious animal pushed furiously towards him. He had turned on his side and opened his enormous jaws, when the youth, diving dexterously, seized the shark with his left hand, somewhere below the upper fins, and stabbed him repeatedly in the belly. The animal, enraged with pain, and streaming with blood, attempted in vain to disengage himself. The crews of the surrounding vessels saw that the combat was decided; but they were ignorant which was slain, till the shark, exhausted by loss of blood, was seen nearer the shore, and along with him his gallant conqueror--who, flushed with victory, redoubled his efforts, and, with the aid of an ebbing tide, dragged him to the beach. Finally, he ripped open the stomach of the fish, and buried the severed half of his friend's body with the trunk in the same grave."

[Illustration: Hammer-headed Shark.--(Squalus Zygæna.)]

It is no uncommon thing for the negroes, who are admirable divers, thus to attack and vanquish the dreaded shark, but success can only be achieved by consummate dexterity, and by those who are armed for this express purpose.

Ordinary swimmers are constantly falling a prey to the sharks of warm climates. Thus Sir Brooke Watson, when in the West Indies, as a youth, was swimming at a little distance from a ship, when he saw a shark making towards him. Struck with terror at its approach, he immediately cried out for assistance. A rope was instantly thrown, but, even while the men were in the act of drawing him up the ship's side, the monster darted after him, and at a single snap took off his leg.

Fortunately for the friends of sea-bathing on our shores, the white shark, like his relation, the monstrous Hammer-headed Zygæna, appears but seldom in the colder latitudes, though both have occasionally been found on the British coast.

[Illustration: Picked Dog-Fish.]

The northern ocean has got its peculiar sharks, but they are generally either good-natured like the huge basking shark (_S. maximus_), which feeds on sea-weeds and medusæ, or else like the _Picked_ dog-fish (_Galeus acanthius_), of too small a size to be dangerous to man, in spite of the ferocity of their nature.

[Illustration: Blue Shark.]

But the dog-fish and several other species of our seas, such as the Blue Shark (_Carcharias glaucus_), though they do not attempt the fisherman's life, are extremely troublesome and injurious to him, by hovering about his boat and cutting the hooks from the lines in rapid succession. This, indeed, often leads to their own destruction, but when their teeth do not deliver them from their difficulty, the blue sharks, which hover about the Cornish coast during the pilchard season, have a singular method of proceeding, which is, by rolling the body round so as to twine the line about them throughout its whole length; and sometimes this is done in such a complicated manner, that Mr. Yarrell has known a fisherman give up any attempt to unroll it as a hopeless task. To the pilchard drift-net this shark is a still more dangerous enemy, and it is common for it to pass in succession along the whole length of net, cutting out, as with shears, the fish and the net that holds them, and swallowing both together.

[Illustration: Saw-Fish.]

[Illustration: Sword-Fish.]

The Saw-snouted Shark or Saw-fish (_Squalus pristis_), which grows to fifteen feet in length, and the Sword-fish (_Xiphias gladius_, _platypterus_), are furnished with peculiarly formidable weapons. The long flat snout of the former is set with teeth on both sides through its whole length, while the upper jaw of the latter terminates in a long sword-shaped snout. A twenty-feet long sword-fish once ran his sword with such violence into the keel of an East Indiaman, that it penetrated up to the root, and the fish itself was killed by the violence of the shock. The perforated beam, with the driven-in sword, are both preserved in the British Museum, and give a good idea of the prodigious power of the leviathans of ocean.

[Illustration: Torpedo.]

While most fishes only rely upon their well-armed jaws, their physical strength, or their rapidity, for attack or defence, some of them are provided with more mysterious weapons, and stun their victims or their enemies by electrical discharges.

[Illustration: Muscles and Electric Batteries of the Torpedo.]

The Torpedo of the Mediterranean is furnished with wonderful organs for this purpose, situated on each side of the anterior part of the body,--perfect galvanic batteries, consisting of a multitude of small prismatic columns, subdivided into cells, and interwoven with a multitude of nerves, which serve to disengage the electric fluid, and discharge it according to the will of the fish, or when it is excited by some external stimulus. The shock of the torpedo is not so strong as that of the electric eel (_Gymnotus electricus_) of the Orinoco, which is able to stun a horse, but its power suffices to paralyse the arm of a man. A Sly, or Silurus, found in the Nile or Senegal, and called by the Arabs _raasch_, or lightning, and one of the many Tetrodons inhabiting the tropical seas, is endowed with a similar faculty of producing galvanic shocks.

[Illustration: Electric Eel.]

Some fishes, to whom nature has denied all other offensive weapons, have recourse to stratagem for procuring their food. Hidden in the mud, the Star-gazer (_Uranoscopus scaber_) exposes only the tip of the head, and waving the beards with which its lips are furnished in various directions, decoys the smaller fishes and marine insects, that mistake these organs for worms.

The Angler, or Sea-devil (_Lophius piscatorius_), a slow swimmer, who would very often be obliged to fast if he had only his swiftness to rely upon, uses a similar stratagem. Crouching close to the ground, he stirs up the sand or mud, and, hidden by the obscurity thus produced, attracts many a prize by leisurely moving to and fro the two slender and elongated appendages on his head, the first of which, the better to deceive, is broad and flattened at the end, inviting pursuit by the shining silvery appearance of the dilated part. Even the great European Sly, a fish which has been known to grow to the length of fifteen feet, and to attain a weight of 300 lbs. is not ashamed to owe its food to similar deceits. Like a true lazzarone, the fat creature lies hidden in the mud of rivers, its mouth half open, and angling with its long beards.

[Illustration: Angler.]

[Illustration: European Sly.--(Silurus glanis.)]

But no fish catches its prey in a more remarkable manner than the Beaked, or Rostrated Chætodon, a native of the fresh waters of India. When he sees a fly alighting on any of the plants which overhang the shallow water, he approaches with the utmost caution, coming as perpendicularly as possible under the object of his meditated attack. Then placing himself in an oblique direction, with the mouth and eyes near the surface, he remains a moment immoveable, taking his aim like a first-rate rifleman. Having fixed his eyes directly on the insect, he darts at it a drop of water from his tubular snout, but without showing his mouth above the surface, from which only the drop seems to rise, and that with such effect, that though at the distance of four, five or six feet, it very seldom fails to bring its prey into the water. Another small East Indian fish, the _Toxotes jaculator_, catches its food by a similar dexterous display of archery.

[Illustration: Toxotes Jaculator.]

While all other fishes hunt only for their own benefit, the Indian Remora, or Sucking-fish (_Echeneis Naucrates_), owes to the remarkable striated apparatus on its head, by which it firmly adheres to any object--rock, ship, or animal,--to which it chooses to attach itself, the rare distinction of being employed by man as a hunting-fish. When Columbus first discovered the West Indies, the inhabitants of the coasts of Cuba and Jamaica made use of the remora to catch turtles, by attaching to its tail a strong cord of palm-fibres, which served to drag it out of the water along with its prey. By this means they were able to raise turtles weighing several hundred pounds from the bottom; "for the sucking-fish," says Columbus, "will rather suffer itself to be cut to pieces than let go its hold." In Africa, on the Mozambique coast, a similar method of catching turtles is practised to the present day. Thus a knowledge of the habits of animals, and similar necessities, have given rise to the same hunting artifices among nations that never had the least communication with each other. Everybody knows the fables that have been related of the small Mediterranean remora (_Echeneis remora_). It even owes its Latin name to the marvellous story of its being able to arrest a ship under full sail in the midst of the ocean; and from this imaginary physical power a no less astonishing moral influence was inferred, for the ancients believed that tasting the remora completely subdued the passion of love, and that if a delinquent, wishing to gain time, succeeded in making his judge eat some of its flesh, he was sure of a long delay before the verdict was pronounced.

[Illustration: Sucking-fish. (Remora.)]

[Illustration: Common Weever.]

Most fishes have only a rapid flight to depend upon for their safety; some, however, more favoured by nature, have been provided with peculiar defensive weapons. Thus the dorsal fins of the Dragon-weever (_Trachinus draco_), a small silvery fish, frequently occurring on our shores, are armed with strong spines, that effectually provide against its being easily swallowed by a more powerful enemy. The wounds it inflicts are very troublesome and painful, though it does not appear that the spines contain any poisonous matter, as the fishermen generally believe. At all events, the dragon-weever is not nearly so dangerous as the _Clip bagre_, a kind of silurus or sly, inhabiting the Brazilian rivers, that inflicts with its long spines such painful wounds as to deprive the sufferer of consciousness, and to produce an inflammation that lasts for several weeks. The Lance-tails, or Acanthuri, have a sharp bony process, not unlike the very large thorn of a rose-tree, placed on each side of the tail; by this they can inflict a deep cut on the hand of any one who is so imprudent as to seize them in that part.

[Illustration: Surgeon Fish. (Acanthurus.)]

I could still add a long list of spine-armed fishes, but content myself with noticing the Stickleback, which frequently owes its preservation to the sharp needles with which it is provided.

[Illustration: Diodon.]

The Tetrodons and Diodons have the power of inflating their body at pleasure, and thus raising the small spines dispersed over their sides and abdomen in such a manner, as to operate as a defence against their enemies. These beautiful and remarkable fishes chiefly inhabit the tropical waters, but sometimes wander into higher latitudes. Man is not the only creature driven by the currents of fate far from the place of his birth.

The Flying-fishes (_Exoceti_) are provided with pectoral fins of so great a length, as to be able to carry them, like wings, a great distance through the air. According to Mr. George Bennett ("Wanderings in New South Wales"), they cannot raise themselves when in the atmosphere, the elevation they take depending entirely on the power of the first spring or leap they make on leaving their native element. Their flight, as it is called, carries them fifteen or eighteen feet high over the water, and the lines which they traverse when they enjoy full liberty of motion, are very low curves, and always in the direction of their previous progress in the usual element of fishes. Their silvery wings and blue bodies glittering beneath the rays of a tropical sun, afford a most beautiful spectacle, when, as is frequently the case, they rise into the air by thousands at once, and in all possible directions. The advantage afforded them by their wing-like fins, in escaping from the pursuit of the bonitos and albacores, often, however, leads to their destruction in another element, where gulls and frigate-birds frequently seize them with lightning-like rapidity, ere they fall back again into the ocean. It is amusing to observe a bonito swimming beneath the feeble aëronaut, keeping him steadily in view, and preparing to seize him at the moment of his descent. But the flying-fish often eludes the bite of his enemy, by instantaneously renewing his leap, and not unfrequently escapes by extreme agility.

[Illustration: Flying-Fish.]

The specific gravity of the flying-fish can be most admirably regulated in correspondence with the element through which it may move. The swim-bladder, when distended, occupies nearly the entire cavity of the abdomen, thus containing a large volume of air; and in addition to this, there is a membrane in the mouth which can be inflated through the gills. The pectoral fins, though so large when expanded, can be folded into an exceedingly slender, neat, and compact form, so as to be no hindrance to swimming. A light displayed from the chains of a vessel in a dark night, will bring many flying-fishes on board, where they are esteemed as a great delicacy. Their fate, thus to be persecuted in both elements and to find security nowhere, has often been pitied in prose and verse; but although they excite so much sentimental commiseration, they are themselves no less predaceous than their enemies, feeding chiefly on smaller fishes.

The flying-fish of the West Indian waters is frequently allured by the tepid waters of the Gulf-stream into higher latitudes, and Pennant cites several examples of its having been found near the British coast.

The Flying-Gurnard (_Trigla volitans_) of the Mediterranean, Atlantic, and Indian seas, a highly singular and beautiful species, also raises itself into the air by means of its large pectoral fins. It does not fly very high, but swings itself as far as a musket-ball reaches, and may thus elude even the rapidity of the dolphin. That strangely formed fish, the _Pegasus_ of the Indian seas, is also enabled by its large pectoral fins to support itself for some moments in the air, when it springs over the surface of the water.

[Illustration: Swimming Pegasus.]

Neither the quadrupeds nor the birds are subject to so many persecutions as the fishes, which have inexorable enemies in all classes of animals. Numberless molluscs and zoophytes feed upon their eggs, or devour their minute fry; myriads of sea-birds are on the look-out for them along the strands, or on the high ocean; seals and ice-bears lie in wait for them, while with weapons and deceit, with net, angle and harpoon, man carries death and destruction into their ranks. It would be a difficult task to state with any degree of exactness the number of fishermen disseminated over the face of the globe, but if we consider that, on a moderate calculation, at least a million of persons are directly or indirectly engaged in fishing in Great Britain and Ireland alone, and then cast a glance over the immense coast-line of the ocean, we may without exaggeration affirm that at least one-fiftieth part of the human race lives upon the produce of the seas. If we further reflect that fishes form a great part of the food of all coast-inhabitants, and consider in what masses they are sent into the interior,--fresh, dried, salted, smoked, and pickled,--we cannot doubt that the great extent of the ocean only apparently limits the numbers of the human race, for how many thousands of square miles of the most fruitful soil would it not require to bring forth the quantity of food which the blue and green fields of ocean supply to man? "Bounteous mother," "_Alma parens_," was the name given by the grateful ancients to the corn and grass-producing, herd-feeding earth; but how much more deserving of that endearing appellation is the sea, that, without being ploughed or manured, dispenses her gifts with such inexhaustible profusion! Numberless indeed are the various kinds of fishes which she furnishes to man, for almost every species affords an equally agreeable and healthy food: but of all the finny families or tribes that people the ocean none can compare for utility with that of the _Clupeidæ_, or Herrings, small in size but great in importance. In mile-long shoals, often so thickly pressed that a spear cast into them would stand upright in the living stream, the common herring appears annually on the coasts of north-western Europe, pouring out the horn of abundance into all the lochs, bays, coves, and fiords, from Norway to Ireland, and from Orcadia to Normandy. Sea-birds without end keep thinning their ranks during the whole summer; armies of rorquals, dolphins, seals, shell-fish, cods, and sharks devour them by millions, and yet so countless are their numbers, that whole nations live upon their spoils.

[Illustration: Herring.]

As soon as the season of their approach appears, fleets of herring boats leave the northern ports, provided with drift-nets, about 1200 feet long. The yarn is so thick that the wetted net sinks through its own weight, and need not be held down by stones attached to the lower edge, for it has been found that the herring is more easily caught in a slack net. The upper edge is suspended from the drift-rope by various shorter and smaller ropes, called buoy ropes, to which empty barrels are fastened, and the whole of the floating apparatus is attached by long ropes to the ship. Fishing takes place only during the night, for it is found that the fish strike the nets in much greater numbers when it is dark than while it is light. The darkest nights, therefore, and particularly those in which the surface of the water is ruffled by a fresh breeze, are considered the most favourable. To avoid collisions, each boat is furnished with one or two torches. From off the beach at Yarmouth, where often several thousand boats are fishing at the same time, these numberless lights, passing to and fro in every direction, afford a most lively and brilliant spectacle. The meshes of the net are exactly calculated for the size of the herring, wide enough to receive the head as far as behind the gill-cover, but not so narrow as to allow the pectoral fins to pass. Thus the poor fish, when once entangled, is unable to move backwards or forwards, and remains sticking in the net, like a bad logician on the horns of a dilemma, until the fisherman hauls it on board. In this manner a single net sometimes contains so vast a booty, that it requires all the authority of a Cuvier or a Valenciennes to make us believe the instances they mention. A fisherman of Dieppe caught in one night 280,000 herrings, and threw as many back again into the sea. Sometimes great sloops have been obliged to cut their nets, being about to sink under the superabundant weight of the fish.

The oldest mention of the herring-fishery is found in the chronicles of the monastery of Evesham, of the year 709; while the first French documents on the subject only reach as far as the year 1030. As far back as the days of William the Conqueror, Yarmouth was renowned for its herring-fishery; and Dunkirk and the Brill conducted it on a grand scale centuries before William Beukelaer of Biervliet, near Sluys, introduced a better method of pickling herrings in small kegs, instead of salting them as before in loose irregular heaps. It is very doubtful whether Solon or Lycurgus ever were such benefactors of their respective countries as this simple uneducated fisherman has been to his native land; for the pickled herring mainly contributed to transform a small and insignificant people into a mighty nation. In the year 1603, the value of the herrings exported from Holland amounted to twenty millions of florins; and in 1615, the fishery gave employment to 2000 _buysen_, or smacks, and to 37,000 men. Three years later we see the United Provinces cover the sea with 3000 _buysen_; 9000 additional boats served for the transport of the fishes, and the whole trade gave employment to at least 200,000 individuals. At that time Holland provided all Europe with herrings, and it may without exaggeration be affirmed that this small fish was their best ally and assistant in casting off the Spanish yoke, by providing them with money, the chief sinew of war. Had the emperor Charles V. been able to foresee that Beukelaer's discovery would one day prove so detrimental to his son and successor Philip II., he would hardly have done the poor fisherman the honour to eat a herring and drink a glass of wine over his tomb.

But all human prosperity is subject to change; and thus towards the middle of the sixteenth century a series of calamities ruined the Dutch fisheries. Cromwell gave them the first blow by the Navigation Act; Blake the second, by his victories; in 1703 a French squadron destroyed the greatest part of their herring-smacks; and finally, the competition of the Swedes, and the closing of their ports by the English, under the disastrous domination of Napoleon I., completed the ruin of that branch of trade which had chiefly raised the fortunes of their fathers.

In the year 1814, when the Dutch first began to breathe after having shaken off the yoke of the modern Attila, they made a faint attempt to renew the herring-fishery with 106 boats, which, up to the year 1823, had only increased to 128; since 1836, however, there has been a steady progress, and herring-catching in the Zuyder Zee during the winter months is yearly increasing in importance.

During the second half of the last century, while the herrings began to desert the Dutch nets, they enriched the Swedes, who, during the year 1781, exported from Gottenburg alone 136,649 barrels, each of them containing 1200 herrings. But some years after, the shoals on the Swedish coasts began also to diminish, so that in 1799 there was hardly enough for home consumption. And now commenced the rapid rise and increase of the Scotch herring-fisheries; and it is certainly remarkable that this should have taken place at so late a period, since the British waters are perhaps those which most abound in herrings. When we think of the present grandeur of British commerce, which extends to the most distant parts of the globe, and ransacks all Nature for new articles of trade, it seems almost incredible that up to the middle of the sixteenth century the herring-fishery on the British coasts was left in the hands of the Dutch and Spaniards, and that the acute and industrious Scotchmen should have been so tardy in working the rich gold-mines lying at their gates. But if their appearance in the market has been late, they have made up for lost time, by completely distancing all their competitors. In 1855, the Scotch herring-fisheries employed no less than 11,000 smacks or boats, manned by 40,000 seamen, who were assisted by 28,000 curers and labourers, exclusive of the vessels and men bringing salt and barrels or engaged in carrying on the export trade.

The English herring-fishery is also extremely important, for Yarmouth alone employs in this branch of trade about 400 sloops, of from forty to seventy tons, the largest of which have ten or twelve men on board. Three of these sloops, belonging to the same proprietor, landed, in the year 1857, 285 lasts, or 3,762,000 fishes; and as each last was sold for £14 sterling, it is probable that no whaler made a better business that season. The importance of the Yarmouth herring-fishery may be inferred from the fact, that it gives employment and bread to about 5,000 persons during several months of the year, and engages a capital of at least £700,000. No wonder, that among the north seamen the herring-fishery is called the "great" fishery, while that of the whale is denominated only the "small."

But the herring is a very capricious creature, seldom remaining long in one place; and there is not a station along the British coast which is not liable to great changes in its visits, as well with regard to time as to quantity. The real causes of these irregularities are unknown; the firing of guns, the manufacture of kelp, and the paddling of steam-boats have been assigned as reasons, but such reasons are quite imaginary. The progress of science promises to find, however, a remedy even for the caprices of the herring; and if his shoals frequently appear and disappear again in the more retired bays or fiords of Norway, before the fishermen are apprised of his movements, the electric telegraph (the most wonderful discovery of a time so rich in wonderful inventions), will be used for his more effectual capture. By this time the wires are already laid, which are to communicate along the whole Scandinavian coast, and with the rapidity of lightning, every important movement of the marine hosts. Poor herring! who would have thought, when Franklin made his first experiments upon electricity, that that mysterious power should ever be used for thy destruction!

The supposed migration of herrings to and from the high northern latitudes is not founded on fact; the herring has never been seen in abundance in the northern seas, nor have our whale-fishers or Arctic voyagers taken any particular notice of them. There is no fishery for them of any consequence either in Greenland or Iceland. On the southern coast of Greenland the herring is a rare fish, and, according to Crantz, only a small variety makes its appearance on the northern shore. This small variety, or species, was found by Sir John Franklin on the shore of the Polar basin, on his second journey. There can be no doubt that the herring inhabits the deep water all round our coast, and only approaches the shores for the purpose of depositing its spawn within the immediate influence of the two principal agents in vivification--increased temperature and oxygen--and as soon as that essential object is effected, the shoals that haunt the superficial waters disappear, but individuals are found, and many are to be caught throughout the year. So far are they from being migratory to us from the north only, that they visit the west coast of Cork in August, arriving there much earlier than those which come down the Irish Channel, and long before their brethren make their appearance at places much farther north. Our common herring spawns towards the end of October, or the beginning of November, and it is for two or three months previous to this, when they assemble in immense numbers, that the fishing is carried on, which is of such great and national importance. "And here," Mr. Couch observes, "we cannot but admire the economy of Divine Providence, by which this and several other species of fish are brought to the shores, within reach of man, at the time when they are in their highest perfection and best fitted to be his food." The herring having spawned, retires to deep water, and the fishing ends for that season. While inhabiting the depths of the ocean, its food is said, by Dr. Knox, to consist principally of minute entomostraceous animals, but it is certainly less choice in its selection when near the shore.

[Illustration: Pilchard.]

Although the common herring of our northern seas is beyond all doubt the most important of the tribe, yet there is no sea, no coast, where other species of the same family are not a source of abundance to man, and of astonishment by their vast numbers. Thus the enormous shoals of Pilchards appearing along our south-western coasts are not less valuable to the fishermen of Devon and Cornwall than the common herring to those of the North Sea. The older naturalists considered the pilchard, like the herring, as a visitor from a distant region, and they assigned to it also the same place of resort as that fish, with which indeed the pilchard has been sometimes confounded. To this it will be a sufficient reply, that the pilchard is never seen in the Northern Ocean. They frequent the French coasts, and are seen on those of Spain, but on neither in considerable numbers or with much regularity; so that few fishes confine themselves within such narrow bounds. On the coast of Cornwall they are found throughout all the seasons of the year, and even there their habits vary in the different months. In January they keep near the bottom, and are chiefly hauled up in the stomachs of ravenous fishes; in March they sometimes assemble in _schulls_, but this union is only partial and not permanent and only becomes so in July; when they regularly and permanently congregate so as to invite the fisherman's pursuit. The season and situation for spawning, and the choice of food, are the chief reasons which influence the motions of the great bodies of these fish; and it is probable that a thorough knowledge of these

## particulars would explain all the variations which have been noticed in

the doings of the pilchard, in the numerous unsuccessful seasons of the fishery.

They feed with voracity on small crustaceous animals, and Mr. Yarrell frequently found their stomachs crammed with thousands of a minute species of shrimp, not larger than a flea. It is probably when they are in search of something like this, that fishermen report they have seen them lying in myriads quietly at the bottom, examining with their mouths the sand and small stones in shallow water. The abundance of this food must be enormous, to satisfy such a host.

"When near the coast," says the author of the "History of British Fishes," "the assemblage of pilchards assumes the arrangement of a mighty army, with its wings stretching parallel to the land, and the whole is composed of numberless smaller bodies, which are perpetually joining together, shifting their position, and separating again. There are three stations occupied by this great body, that have their separate influence on the success of the fishery. One is to the eastward of the Lizard, the most eastern extremity, reaching to the Bay of Bigbury in Devonshire, beyond which no fishing is carried on, except that it occasionally extends to Dartmouth; a second station is included between the Lizard and Land's End; and the third is on the north coast of the county, the chief station being about St. Ives. The subordinate motions of the shoals are much regulated by the tide, against the current of which they are rarely known to go, and the whole will sometimes remain parallel to the coast for several weeks, at the distance of a few leagues; and then, as if by general consent, they will advance close to the shore, sometimes without being discovered till they have reached it. This usually happens when the tides are strongest, and is the period when the principal opportunity is afforded for the prosecution of the sean-fishery." The quantity of pilchards taken is sometimes incredibly large. In 1847, a very productive year, 40,000 hogsheads were cured in Cornwall alone, representing probably, after all deductions, a net value to the takers of £80,000. The Sardine (_Clupea sardina_), a fish closely allied to the Pilchard though smaller, is considered as the most savoury of all the herring tribe. It is chiefly found in the Mediterranean, on the coasts of South France and Africa, and about the islands of Corsica and Sardinia, where it plays a no less important part than the Pilchard on the coasts of Cornwall and Devonshire.

Though a much less valuable fish than its larger-sized relatives, the diminutive Sprat is not to be despised. Coming into the market in immense quantities, and at a very moderate price, immediately after the herring season is over, it affords during all the winter months a cheap and agreeable food. Like all other species of the herring tribe, the sprats are capricious wanderers, and make their appearance in exceedingly variable numbers. The coasts of Kent, Essex, and Suffolk, are the most productive. So great is the supply thence obtained, that notwithstanding the immense quantity consumed by the vast population of London and its neighbourhood, there is yet occasionally a surplus to be disposed of at so low a price, as to induce the farmers, even so near the metropolis as Dartford, to use them for manure.

[Illustration: Anchovy.]

The Mediterranean seems to be the peculiar birthplace of the Anchovy (_Engraulis encrasicholus_), where it appears in the spawning season in countless multitudes along the shallow coasts. It is about four inches long, of a bluish-brown colour on the back, and silvery-white on the belly. It is covered with large thin and easily deciduous scales, and may be readily distinguished from the Sprat and other kindred species by the anal fins being remarkably short. It is mostly caught in the neighbourhood of Antibes, Frejus, and St. Tropez, and sent pickled in enormous quantities to the fair of Beaucaire, from whence it is transported in small tin boxes to all parts of the world.

[Illustration: Haddock.]

[Illustration: Ling.]

[Illustration: Cod.]

The Cod-family, to which among others, the Dorse, the Haddock, the Whiting, the Hake, the Ling, and other valuable fishes belong, ranks next to that of the herrings in importance to man. In the seas with which Europeans are best acquainted the common Cod, the chief representative of the tribe, is found universally, from Iceland to very nearly as far south as Gibraltar, but appears most abundantly on the eastern side of the American continent, and among its numerous islands, from 40° up to 66° N. lat., where it may be said to hold dominion from the outer edge of the great banks of Newfoundland, which are more than three hundred miles from land, to the verge of every creek and cove of the bounding coast. To support such a mass of living beings, the ocean sends forth its periodical masses of other living beings. At one season the cod is accompanied by countless myriads of the Capelin (_Salmo arcticus_), and at another by equal hosts of a molluscous animal, the Cuttle-fish (_Sepia loligo_), called in Newfoundland the squid. The three animals are migratory, and man, who stations himself on the shore for their combined destruction, conducts his movements according to their migrations, capturing millions upon millions of capelins and squids, to serve as a bait for the capture of millions of cods. In the United Kingdom alone this fish, in the catching, the curing, the partial consumption, and sale, supplies employment, food, and profit to thousands of the human race; but the banks of Newfoundland are the chief scene of its destruction. As soon as spring appears, England sends forth 2000 ships, with 30,000 men, across the Atlantic, towards those teeming shallows; France about one-half the number; and the Americans as many as both together. On an average, each ship is reckoned to catch about 40,000 fishes; and we may form some idea of the voracity, as well as of the numbers of the cod, when we hear that in the course of a single day a good fisherman is able to haul up four hundred one after another with his line--no easy task considering the size of the fish, which often attains a length of from two to three feet and a weight of from twenty to forty pounds.

The captured fish have but little time left them to bewail their lot, for a few thousands will be "dressed down"--that is, gutted, boned and salted--in the course of two or three hours. For this purpose the crew divide themselves into throaters, headers, splitters, salters, and packers. First the throater passes his sharp knife across the throat of the unfortunate cod to the bone and rips open the bowels. He then passes it quickly to the header, who with a strong sudden wrench pulls off the head and tears out the entrails, which he casts overboard, passing at the same time the fish instantly to the splitter, who with one cut lays it open from head to tail, and almost in the twinkling of an eye with another cut takes out the backbone. After separating the sounds, which are placed with the tongues, and packed in barrels as a great delicacy, the backbone follows the entrails overboard, while the fish at the same moment is passed with the other hand to the salter. Such is the amazing quickness of the operations of heading and splitting that a good workman will often decapitate and take out the entrails and backbone of six fish in a minute. Every fisherman is supposed to know something of each of these operations, and no rivals at cricket ever entered with more ardour into their work than do some athletic champions for the palm of "dressing down" after a "day's catch."

Besides its excellent firm flesh, the liver-oil of the cod is used as a valuable medicine, and serves to restore many a scrofulous or rickety child to health. The sound-bladder is also employed by the Icelanders for the manufacture of fish-lime or isinglass. The best quality of the latter article, however, is afforded by a species of Sturgeon (_Accipenser Huso_) which is chiefly found in the Black and Caspian seas, and ascends the tributary rivers in immense numbers.

The Common Sturgeon (_Accipenser sturio_), though principally frequenting the seas and rivers of North-Eastern Europe, where, especially in the Volga, extensive fisheries are established for its destruction, is also captured on the coasts of Great Britain and Ireland, as examples are by no means uncommon in the fish-mongers' shops of our great cities, a few coming into the hands of the principal dealers every season. Yarrell mentions one caught in a stake-net near Findhorn, in Scotland, in July 1833, which measured eight feet six inches in length and weighed two hundred and three pounds; but in the Baltic specimens of a length of eighteen feet and weighing a thousand pounds have occasionally been captured. The body is long and slender from the shoulders backward, somewhat pentagonal in shape, with five longitudinal rows of flattened plates, with pointed central spines, directed backwards, and the snout is tapering and beak-shaped, the mouth small and toothless, so that the sturgeon, though almost equalling the white shark in size, is of a much more harmless character and formidable only to the crustaceans, small fish, or soft animals, he meets with at the bottom in deep water, beyond the ordinary reach of sea-nets. Hence he is rarely caught in the open sea, but falls an easy prey to the cunning of man when entering the friths, estuaries, and rivers for the purpose of spawning. The sturgeon is a highly valuable fish not only for its well-flavoured flesh but also for its roe, which furnishes the delicate caviar of commerce. The smallest but most highly esteemed of the sturgeons is the Sterlet of the Volga, which sometimes fetches such extravagant prices that Prince Potemkin has been known to pay three hundred roubles for a single tureen of sterlet-soup.

[Illustration: Common Sturgeon.]

While many of the numerous members of the salmon family confine themselves to the rivulet or to the lake, others alternate, like the sturgeons, between the river and the sea. Of these the most remarkable is the noble fish which has given its name to the whole tribe, and may justly be considered as its head, not only in point of size but also for its wide-spread utility to man.

Every spring or summer the salmon leave the ocean to deposit their spawn in the sweet waters, often at a distance of many hundred miles in the interior of the Continent, so that the same fish which during part of the year may be breasting the waves of the North Sea, may at another be forcing the current of an Alpine stream. Their onward progress is not easily stopped: they shoot up rapids with the velocity of arrows, and make wonderful efforts to surmount cascades or weirs by leaping, frequently clearing an elevation of eight or ten feet. These surprising bounds appear to be accomplished by a sudden jerk, which is given to its body by the animal from a bent into a straight position. If they fail in their attempt, and fall back into the stream, it is only to rest a short time, and thus recruit their strength for a new effort. The fall of Kilmaroc, on the Beauly, in Inverness-shire, is one of the spots where the leaping feats of the salmon can best be witnessed. "The pool below that fall," says Mr. Mudie, in the _British Naturalist_, "is very large, and as it is the head of the run in one of the finest salmon rivers in the north, and only a few miles distant from the sea, it is literally thronged with salmon, which are continually attempting to pass the fall, but without success, as the limit of their perpendicular spring does not appear to exceed twelve or fourteen feet; at least, if they leap higher than that, they are aimless and exhausted, and the force of the current dashes them down again before they have recovered their energy. They often kill themselves by the violence of their exertions to ascend, and sometimes they fall upon the rocks and are captured. It is indeed said that one of the wonders which the Frasers of Lovat, who are lords of the manor, used to show their guests was a voluntarily cooked salmon at the falls of Kilmaroc. For this purpose a kettle was placed upon the flat rock on the south side of the fall, close by the edge of the water and kept full and boiling. There is a considerable extent of the rock where tents were erected, and the whole was under a canopy of overshadowing trees. There the company are said to have waited until a salmon fell into the kettle, and was boiled in their presence. We have seen as many as eighty taken in a pool lower down the river at one haul of the seine, and one of the number weighed more than sixty pounds."

As the salmon laboriously ascend the rivers, it may easily be imagined that the cunning and rapacity of man seeks every opportunity to intercept their progress. Nets of the most various form and construction are employed for their capture; numbers are entrapped in enclosed spaces formed in weirs, into which they enter as they push up the stream, and are then prevented by a grating of a peculiar contrivance from returning or getting out; and many are speared, a mode frequently practised at night-time, when torches are made use of to attract them to the surface, or to betray them by their silvery reflection to the attentive fisherman.

The ruddy gleam illumining the river banks or sparkling in the agitated waters, the black sky above, the deep contrasts of light and shade, attach a romantic interest to this nocturnal sport, which has been both practised and sung by Walter Scott.

"'Tis blithe along the midnight tide With stalwart arm the boat to guide, On high the dazzling blaze to rear And heedful plunge the barbed spear. Rock, wood, and scour emerging bright, Fling on the stream their ruddy light, And from the bank our band appears Like Genii armed with fiery spears."

The natural history of the salmon was until lately but very imperfectly known, as the parr (brandling, samlet) and the grilse, which are now fully proved to be but intermediate stages of its growth, were supposed by Yarrell to be distinct fishes. The first person who seems to have suspected the true nature of the parr was James Hogg, the Ettrick shepherd, who in his usual eccentric way took some pains to verify his opinion. As an angler, he had often caught the parr in its transition state, and had frequently captured smolts (at that time the only acknowledged youthful salmon) with the scales barely covering the bars or finger marks of the parr. Wondering at this, he marked a great number of the lesser fish and offered rewards of whisky (being himself a great admirer of the genuine mountain-dew) to the peasantry to bring him any fish that had evidently undergone the change. These crude experiments of the talented shepherd convinced him that the parr were the young of the salmon in the first stage, and since then professed naturalists have fully settled the question by watching the egg into life, and tracing the growth of the young fish step by step until it ultimately changed into the kingly salmon.

This ignorance of the true nature of the parr had most disastrous effects, as it largely contributed to the depopulation of our streams, for the farmers and cottars who resided near the rivers used not unfrequently, after filling the frying-pan with parr, to feed their pigs with them, and myriads were annually killed by juvenile anglers. This truly deplorable havoc has fortunately been arrested by Act of Parliament, but the killing of grilse is still, I believe, a fertile source of destruction,[O] and should undoubtedly be restrained by law, as the wholesale slaughter of these juvenile fishes is a most lamentable example of improvident waste.

[Footnote O: In 1862, 8,467 salmon and 25,042 grilse were captured in the Tweed.]

In former times our rivers abounded with salmon, more than 200,000 having been caught in a single summer in the Tweed alone, and 2,500 at one haul in the river Thurso; but, besides the causes above mentioned, over fishing or fishing at an improper season, and probably in many cases the pollution of the streams with deleterious matter from mines or manufactories, have considerably reduced their numbers. Fortunately, public attention has at length been thoroughly aroused to the danger which menaces our king of fishes; and, what with better laws for his protection and the successful attempts that have latterly been made in artificial fish-breeding, we may hope that more prosperous times are in store for our salmon-fisheries.

[Illustration: Salmo Rossii]

The salmon not only frequents the streams of Northern Europe but ascends in vast multitudes the giant rivers of Siberia and of North America. It is fished by the Ostjak and the Tunguse, and speared by the Indian of the New World. Ross's Arctic salmon, which is of a more slender form than the common salmon, differently marked and coloured, and with a remarkably long under jaw, is so extremely abundant in the sea near the mouths of the rivers of Boothia Felix that 3,378 were obtained at one haul of a small-sized seine. The rivers of Kamtschatka abound in salmon of various kinds, so that the stream, swelling as it were with living waves, not seldom overflows its banks and casts multitudes ashore. Steller affirms that, in that almost uninhabited peninsula, the bears and dogs and other animals catch more of these fishes with their mouths and feet than man in other countries with all his cunning devices of net and angle.

The salmon of Iceland, which formerly remained undisturbed by the phlegmatic inhabitants, are now caught in large numbers for the British market. A small river, bearing the significant name of Laxaa or Salmon river, has been rented for the trifling sum of 100_l._ a year by an English company which sends every spring its agents to the spot, well provided with the best fishing apparatus. The captured fish are immediately boiled and hermetically packed in tin boxes, so that they can be eaten in London almost as fresh as if they had just been caught. Other valuable salmon-streams in Iceland and Norway pay us a similar tribute; and as commerce, aided by the steamboat and the railway, extends her empire, rivers more and more distant are made to supply the deficiencies of our native streams. More than 150,000 salmon are annually caught in Aljaska--not a quarter of a century ago a real "ultima Thule"--and after having been well pickled and smoked at the various fishing-stations are chiefly sent from Sitcha to Hamburg.

Nature has denied the salmon to the streams of Australia and New Zealand; but as the eggs of this fish can be preserved for a very long time, they have been transported with perfect success to those far-distant colonies.

[Illustration: Tunny.]

If neither the salmon, nor the common herring, nor the cod, dwell in the Mediterranean, the fishermen of that sea rejoice in the capture of the Tunny, the chief of the mackerel or scomberoid family. Its usual length is about two feet, but it sometimes grows to eight or ten; and Pennant saw one killed in 1769, when he was at Inverary, that weighed 460 pounds. The flesh is as firm as that of the sturgeon, but of a finer flavour.

"In May and June," says Mr. Yarrell, "the adult fish rove along the coast of the Mediterranean in large shoals and triangular array. They are extremely timid, and easily induced to take a new and apparently an open course, in order to avoid any suspected danger. But the fishermen take advantage of this peculiarity for their destruction by placing a look-out or sentinel on some elevated spot, who makes the signal that the shoal of tunnies is approaching, and points out the direction in which it will come. Immediately a great number of boats set off, range themselves in a curved line, and, joining their nets, form an enclosure which alarms the fish, while the fishermen, drawing closer and closer, and adding fresh nets, still continue driving the tunnies towards the shore, where they are ultimately killed with poles.

"But the grandest mode of catching the tunny is by means of the French _madrague_, or, as the Italians call it, _tonnaro_. Series of long and deep nets, fixed vertically by corks at their upper edges, and with lead and stones at the bottom, are kept in a particular position by anchors, so as to form an enclosure parallel to the coast, sometimes extending an Italian mile in length; this is divided into several chambers by nets placed across, leaving narrow openings on the land side. The tunnies pass between the coast and the tonnaro; when arrived at the end, they are stopped by one of the cross-nets, which closes the passage against them, and obliges them to enter the tonnaro by the opening which is left for them. When once in, they are driven by various means from chamber to chamber to the last, which is called the chamber of death. Here a strong net, placed horizontally, that can be raised at pleasure, brings the tunnies to the surface, and the work of destruction commences. The tonnaro fishery used to be one of the great amusements of rich Sicilians, and, at the same time, one of the most considerable sources of their wealth. When Louis XIII. visited Marseilles, he was invited to a tunny-fishery, at the principal _madrague_ of Morgiou, and found the diversion so much to his taste that he often said it was the pleasantest day he had spent in his whole progress through the south."

[Illustration: Mackerel.]

The elegant shape and beautiful colouring of the common Mackerel are too well known to require any particular description, and its qualities as an edible fish have been long duly appreciated. It dies very soon after it is taken out of the water, exhibits for a short time a phosphoric light, and partly loses the brilliancy of its hues. Like all other members of the family, it is extremely voracious, and makes great havoc among the herring-shoals, although its own length is only from twelve to sixteen inches. It inhabits the northern Atlantic, and is caught in large numbers along the British coast, where it is preceded in its annual visit by the Gar-fish, which for this reason has received also the name of Mackerel-guide. The older naturalists ascribed to the mackerel the same distant migrations as to the tunny, but most probably it only retires during the winter into the deeper waters, at no very great distance from the shores, where it appears during the summer season in such incalculable numbers.

[Illustration: Gar-Fish.]

The mackerel is caught with long nets or by hand-lines. It bites greedily at every bait, but generally such a one is preferred as best represents a living prey darting through the water--either some silvery scaled fish, or a piece of metal, or of scarlet cloth. With swelling sails the boat flies along, and a sharp wind is generally considered so favourable that it is called a "Mackerel-breeze." The line is short, but made heavy with lead, and in this manner a couple of men can catch a thousand in one day. The more rapid the boat the greater the success, for the mackerel rushes like lightning after the glittering bait, taking it for a flying prey. The chieftains of the Sandwich Islands used to catch the bonito mackerels in a similar way, by attaching flying-fish to their hooks, and rapidly skimming the surface of the waters. Thus everywhere man knows how to turn to his advantage the peculiar instincts or habits of the animal creation.

[Illustration: Bonito.]

The author of "Wild Sports of the West" has favoured us with an animated description of mackerel-fishing on the coast of Ireland.

"It was evident that the bay was full of mackerel. In every direction, and as far as the eye could range, gulls and puffins were collected, and, to judge by their activity and clamour, there appeared ample employment for them among the fry beneath. We immediately bore away for the place where these birds were numerously congregated, and the lines were scarcely overboard when we found ourselves in the centre of a shoal of mackerel. For two hours we killed these beautiful fish, as fast as the baits could be renewed and the lines hauled in; and when we left off fishing, actually wearied with sport, we found that we had taken above five hundred, including a number of the coarser species, called Horse-mackerel. There is not, on sea or river, always excepting angling for salmon, any sport comparable to this delightful amusement: full of life and bustle, everything about it is animated and exhilarating; a brisk breeze and fair sky, the boat in quick and constant motion, all is calculated to interest and excite. He who has experienced the glorious sensations of sailing on the Western Ocean, a bright autumnal sky above, a deep-green lucid swell around, a steady breeze, and as much of it as the hooker can stand up to, will estimate the exquisite enjoyment our morning's mackerel-fishing afforded."

Although an occasional visitor of our shores, the Bonito, or Stripe-bellied Tunny (_Thynnus pelamys_), which is much inferior in size to the common tunny of the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, is a true ocean-fish, and generally met with at a vast distance from land. It inhabits the warmer seas, of which it is one of the most active and voracious denizens. It is well known to all voyagers within the tropics for the amusement it affords by its accompanying the vessel in its track, and by its pursuit of the flying-fish. But in its turn the predacious Bonito is subject to the persecutions of the huge Sperm-whale, who will often drive whole shoals before him, and crush dozens at a time between his prodigious jaws.

The Pelamid (_Thynnus sarda_), which abounds in all districts of the Mediterranean and on both sides of the Atlantic, has but very lately been discovered in the British waters, a single specimen having been caught a few years ago at the mouth of the North Esk. It greatly resembles the species just mentioned in form and mode of life, prowling about the high seas for cephalopods and flying-fishes, and is very commonly confounded with the bonito by sailors, who also give both of them the name of Skip-jacks, expressive of the habit which many of the large Scomberoids have of skimming the surface of the sea, and springing occasionally into the air.

[Illustration: Pilot-Fish.--(Naucrates ductor.)]

Another member of the mackerel family, the Pilot-Fish (_Naucrates ductor_), easily recognised by the three dark-blue bands which surround its silvery body, will frequently attend a ship during its course at sea for weeks or even months together, most likely to profit by the offal thrown overboard. Regardless of the useful precept, "avoid bad company," it is frequently found attending the white shark, and owes its name to its being supposed to act as a trusty guide or friendly monitor to that voracious monster, sometimes directing it where to find a good meal, and at others warning it when to avoid a dangerous bait. At all events, the pilot-fish is well rewarded for his attendance by snatching up the morsels which are overlooked by his companion, and as he is an excellent swimmer, and probably keeps a good look-out, has but little reason to fear being snatched up himself.

"It has been observed," says Yarrell, "that when a shark and his pilot were following a vessel, if meat was thrown overboard cut into small pieces, and therefore unworthy the shark's attention, the pilot-fish showed his true motive of action by deserting both shark and ship to feed at his leisure on the morsels."

The family of the anguilliform fishes, characterised by their serpent-like bodies, destitute of ventral fins, and generally covered by a slippery skin, with, in some of the genera, small scales embedded therein, likewise comprises a number of highly interesting and useful species, forming many generic groups.

Its chief representative in our waters is the Common Eel (_Anguilla vulgaris_), which, though a frequent inhabitant of our lakes, ponds, and rivers, may also justly be reckoned among the marine fishes; for the same wonderful instinct which prompts the salmon and the sturgeon annually to leave the high seas and seek the inland streams for the sake of perpetuating their race, forces also the eel to migrate, but his peregrinations are of an opposite character, for here the full-grown fishes descend the rivers to deposit their spawn in the sea, and the young, after having been born in the brackish estuaries, ascend the streams to accomplish their growth in the sweet waters. The mode of procreation of eels, which for ages had been an enigma, has now at length been completely elucidated by Professor Rathke, who discovered that the eggs, which are of microscopic smallness, so as to be undistinguishable by the naked eye from the fat in which they lie imbedded, are expelled through an opening hardly large enough to admit the point of a needle. The energy of the salmon in swimming stream-upwards for hundreds and hundreds of miles, and bounding over rapids and cataracts, is truly wonderful, but the instinctive efforts of the little eels or _elvers_ to surmount obstacles that seem quite out of proportion to their strength are no less admirable. Mr. Anderson, upwards of a century ago, described the young eels as ascending the upright posts and gates of the waterworks at Norwich until they came into the dam above; and Sir Humphry Davy, who was witness of a vast migration of elvers at Ballyshannon, speaks of the mouth of the river under the fall as blackened by millions of little eels. "Thousands," he adds, "died, but their bodies remaining moist, served as the ladder for others to make their way; and I saw some ascending even perpendicular stones, making their road through wet moss, or adhering to some eels that had died in the attempt. Such is the energy of these little animals that they continue to find their way in immense numbers to Loch Erne. Even the mighty fall of Schaffhausen (which stops the salmon) does not prevent them from making their way to the Lake of Constance, where I have seen many very large eels." After the little eels have gained the summit of a fall, they rest for a while with their heads protruded into the stream. They then urge themselves forward, taking advantage of every projecting stone or slack water, and never get carried back by the current. Myriads are destroyed on the way by birds or fishes; but, as usual, their greatest enemy is man, who not only devours whole cart-loads of little eels not larger than a knitting-needle, frying them into cakes, which are said to be delicious, though rather queer-looking from the number of little eyes with which they are bespangled, but after getting tired of eating them, actually feeds his pigs with them, or even uses them for manure. A prodigal waste which should be looked after, as these little eels would soon increase their weight, and consequently their value a thousand fold. On the Continent many lakes and ponds have been stocked with elvers, packed in wet grass, and sent by the railroads or the post far into the interior of the country.

Eels are pre-eminently nocturnal animals. They always congregate at the darkest parts of the stews in which they are kept, and invariably select the darkest nights for their autumnal migration to the sea. Owing to the smallness of their gill aperture, the membranous folds of which, by closing the orifice when the eel is out of the water, prevents the desiccation of the branchiæ, they have the power of living a long time out of the water when the air is humid, and not unfrequently travel during the night over the moist surface of meadows or gardens in quest of frogs or other suitable food.

That eels are not devoid of sagacity is proved by many well authenticated anecdotes. "In Otaheite," says Ellis in his "Polynesian Researches," "they are fed till they attain an enormous size. These pets are kept in large holes two or three feet deep, partially filled with water. On the sides of these pits they generally remain, excepting when called by the person who feeds them. I have been several times with the young chief when he has sat down by the side of the hole, and by giving a shrill sort of whistle has brought out an enormous eel, which has moved about the surface of the water and eaten with confidence out of his master's hand."

The eel has many enemies, among others the common heron, who, in spite of the slippery skin of his victim, knows how to drive his denticulated middle claw into his body, or to strike him with his pointed bill. Yarrell relates that a heron had once struck his sharp beak through the head of an eel, piercing both eyes, and that the eel--no doubt remembering that one good turn deserves another--had coiled itself so tightly round the neck of the heron as to stop the bird's respiration: both were dead.

The London market is principally supplied with eels from Holland, a country where they abound. According to Mr. Mayhew, about ten millions of eels, amounting to a weight of 1,500,000 lbs., are annually sold in Billingsgate market. These figures show us at once that the multiplication of eels in our sluggish rivers, which only contain such fish as are comparatively speaking worthless, is a matter worth consideration, and powerfully pleads for the protection and transplantation of the elvers wherever they are likely to prosper.

Eels are extremely susceptible of cold; none whatever are found in the Arctic regions, and at the approach of winter they bury themselves in the mud, where they remain in a state of torpidity until the genial warmth of spring recalls them to a more active state of existence. In this condition they are frequently taken by eel-spears, and in Somersetshire the people know how to find the holes in the banks of rivers in which eels are laid up, by the hoar-frost not lying over them as it does elsewhere, and dig them out in heaps. Though generally only from two to three feet long, eels sometimes acquire a much larger size. Specimens six feet long and fifteen pounds in weight are occasionally captured, and Yarrell saw at Cambridge the preserved skins of two which weighed together fifty pounds. They were taken on draining a fen-dyke at Wisbeach. As eels are but slow in growth, these sizes speak for a great longevity.

[Illustration: Conger Eel.]

The Conger is in its general appearance so nearly allied to the common eel that it might easily be mistaken for the same species. It, however, materially differs from it by its darker colour in the upper part, and its brighter hue beneath, by its dorsal fin beginning near the head, and by its snout generally projecting beyond the lower jaw.

This marine giant of the eel tribe attains a length of ten feet, and a weight of 130 pounds, and is well known on all the rocky parts of the coast of the British Islands, though nowhere more abundant than on the Cornish coast, where, according to Mr. Couch, it is not uncommon for a boat with three men to bring on shore from five hundredweight to two tons. The fishing for congers is always performed at night, and not unattended with danger, as it is quite a common occurrence for a conger to attack the fishermen with open jaws, and so great is the strength of the large specimens that they have occasionally succeeded in pulling the fisherman quite out of his boat, if by any chance he has fastened the line to his arm. The congers that keep among rocks hide themselves in crevices, where they are not unfrequently left by the retiring tide; but in situations free from rocks, congers hide themselves by burrowing in the ground, where it is customary on some parts of the coast of France to employ dogs in their search. In spite of its tough flesh and exceedingly nauseous smell, the conger was highly esteemed by Greek epicures, and in England in the time of the Henrys considered an article of food fit for a king. Thus, the Prince and Poins, according to Falstaff's account, found amongst other reasons for their companionship this one: that both of them were fond of conger and fennel sauce. In our times its flesh, though banished from all aristocratic tables, meets a ready sale at a low price among the poorer classes. In the Isle of Man the conger may be said to take the place of the poor man's pig; it is his bacon, which he would find difficult to save if it were not for these large eels, which are caught in great abundance, and sold at the rate of 2_d._ or 3_d._ per lb. The Manx men split the congers, and then salt them and hang them up to dry on their cottage walls, where they do not exactly contribute to perfume the gale.

The Murry or Muræna differs from the common eel by the want of pectoral fins, and its beautifully-marked skin. It is said to live with equal facility in fresh or salt water, though generally found at sea, and it is as common in the Pacific as it is in the Atlantic and Mediterranean. The only specimen on record as a British fish was caught by a fisherman of Polperro, October 8, 1834; its length was four feet four inches. The muræna has acquired a kind of historical celebrity from the strange fondness with which it was cherished by the Romans, who preserved large quantities of them in their numerous vivaria, as we do the lustrous gold-fish in the water-basins of our gardens. A certain Cajus Hirrius, who lived in the time of Julius Cæsar, was the first that introduced the fashion, which soon became a passion among the wealthy senators and knights of the imperial city, who used to deck their especial pets with all kinds of ornaments. The celebrated orator, Hortensius, the rival of Cicero, had a _piscina_ at Bauli, on the gulf of Baiæ, where he took great delight in a favourite murry that would come at his call and feed from his hand. When the creature died, he was unable to stop his tears; and another celebrated Roman, L. Licinius Crassus, appears to have had an equally tender heart, for he, too, wept at the death of his fishy darling. Vedius Pollio, a Roman knight, has even acquired through these fishes a scandalous renown, by causing now and then a slave that had been guilty of some slight offence to be cast alive and naked into their piscina, and amusing himself with the sight of the murrys lacerating and devouring the body. That this wretch was a friend of the Emperor Augustus harmonises but badly with the ideas of the urbanity of his court which we may have formed from the poems of Horace and Virgil. It is but fair, however, to the character of the emperor to state that he reprobated Pollio's cruelty, and ordered his fish-pond to be filled up.

[Illustration: Ammodyte, or Launce.]

The Launces are distinguished from the eels by their large gill openings, and their caudal fin being separated from their dorsal and anal fins. The common Sand Launce abounds on many parts of our shore. On account of its silvery brightness it is highly esteemed by the fishermen as bait for their hooks, and its remarkable habit of burrowing in the sand as the tide recedes affords easy means of capture. While underground, it most likely gets hold of many an unfortunate lob-worm, mollusc, or crustacean, but on emerging from its retreat it is in its turn preyed upon by the larger fishes. On a calm evening it is an interesting sight to see the surface of the water broken by the repeated plunges of the voracious mackerel as they burst upon the launces from beneath. On the sands at Portobello, near Edinburgh, people of all ages may be seen when the tide is out diligently searching for the sand launce, and raking them out with iron hooks. On the south coast of Devonshire, where the sand launces are extremely plentiful, the fishermen employ a small seine with a fine mesh, and are frequently so successful that six or seven bushels are taken at one haul. The usual length of the sand launce is from five to seven inches. In many localities it is prepared for table, and considered a great delicacy.

Although the Lamprey essentially differs from the eel in the formation of its gills, the softness of its cartilaginous skeleton, and its funnel-shaped mouth provided with sharp teeth, disposed in circles, yet it resembles it closely in its outward form. Its colour is generally a dull brownish olive, clouded with yellowish-white variegations; the fins are tinged with dull orange, and the tail with blue. The Marine or Sea Lamprey inhabits the ocean, but ascends the rivers in spring. Though capable of swimming with considerable vigour and rapidity, it is more commonly seen attached by the mouth to some large stone or other substance, the body hanging at rest, or obeying the motion of the current. Its power of adhesion is so great that a weight of more than twelve pounds may be raised without forcing the fish to quit its hold. Like the eel, it is remarkably tenacious of life, the head strongly attaching itself for several hours to a stone, though by far the greater part of the body be cut away from it. The lamprey is still considered as a delicacy; every schoolboy knows that King Henry I. died of an indigestion caused by this favourite dish; and the town of Gloucester still sends every Christmas a lamprey-pie to Queen Victoria, such as it was wont to offer to its sovereign in the days of the Plantagenets and Tudors.

[Illustration: Myxine.]

The Myxine, Glutinous Hag, or Borer, bears a near resemblance to the lamprey, but stands upon a much inferior degree of organisation, having no eyes--(the sole example of blindness among fishes), and a still softer skeleton, so that, when boiled, it almost entirely dissolves into mucus. In the lamprey and myxine, the branchial cells, which admit water, are lined by the delicate membrane through which the blood is aërated. In the former, however, the external apertures of the branchial cells are placed on the side of the neck; while in the myxine, which feeds on the internal parts of its prey, and buries its head and part of its body in the flesh, the openings of the respiratory organs are removed sufficiently far back to admit of the respiration going on while the animal's head is so inserted. Thus, even in this lowest and meanest of all vertebrate animals, we find a remarkable adaptation of its construction to its wants, and the proof that it has been as well taken care of by its Creator as the highest organised creatures of its class.

[Illustration: Porcupine-Fish--(Diodon hystrix.)]

[Illustration: Globe-Fish.]

[Illustration: Short Sun-Fish.--(Orthagoriscus Mola.)]

[Illustration: Trunk-Fish.--(Ostracion triqueter.)]

[Illustration: File-Fish.--(Balistes erythropterus.)]

One of the most remarkable orders of fishes is that of the Plectognaths, which are distinguished by having the superior maxillary bones and the intermaxillaries soldered together so as to render the upper jaw immovable, or incapable of projection. Among the Plectognaths, we find among others the prickly Globe-fishes and sea-porcupines; the curiously-shaped Sun-fishes, all head and no body; the Ostracions or Trunk-fishes, clothed like the armadillos in a defensive coat of mail, leaving only the tail, fins, mouth, and a small portion of the gill-opening, capable of motion; and the gorgeous Balistæ or File-fishes, which owe their family-name to the peculiar structure of their first dorsal fin. The first and strongest spine of this organ is studded up the front with numerous small projections, which, under the microscope, look like so many points of enamel or pearl arising from the surface of the bone and giving it the appearance of a file. The second smaller spine has in the fore part of its base a projection which, when the spines are elevated, locks into a corresponding notch in the posterior base of the first spine, and fixes it like the trigger of a gun-lock; from which the fish is called in Italy _pesce balestra_, or the cross-bow fish. The strong spine cannot be forced down till the small one has been first depressed and the catch disengaged.

The Plectognaths are mostly denizens of the warmer seas, but the pig-faced trigger-fish of the Mediterranean (_Balistes capriscus_) has been caught three times in the British waters since 1827, and the short sun-fish or molebut, though occurring but occasionally, may be said to have been taken from John o' Groat's to the Land's End. It grows to an immense size, often attaining the diameter of four feet, sometimes even double that size, and occasionally weighing from 300 to 500 pounds. When observed in our seas, the sun-fishes have generally appeared as though they were dead or dying, floating lazily along on one side and making little or no attempt to escape. It is to be presumed that in more congenial waters they evince a greater degree of liveliness.

The order of the Lophobranchii is in many respects too curious and interesting to be passed over in silence. Here the gills, instead of being as usual ranged like the teeth of a comb, are clustered into small filamentous tufts placed by pairs along the branchial arches; the face projects into a long tubular snout, having the mouth either at its extremity, as in the Hippocampus and in the Pipe-fishes, or at its base, as in the Pegasus of the Indian seas; and the body is covered with shields or small plates, which often give it an angular form, and encase it as it were in jointed armour. But the most interesting feature of their economy is the pouches in which the males of the most characteristic genera carry the eggs until they are hatched. In the hippocampi this provision for the safety of the future generation, which strongly reminds one of the kangaroo or the opossum, forms a perfect sack, opening at its commencement only; in the pipe-fishes it is closed along its whole length by two soft flaps folding over each other. Another peculiarity of these interesting little fishes is the independent motion of their eyes, the one glancing hither and thither while its fellow remains motionless, or looks in different directions. This phenomenon of _double_ vision, which was long supposed to be peculiar to the chameleon, is, however, not confined to this singular reptile or to the hippocampi and pipe-fishes, but has been found by Mr. Gosse to exist likewise in the Little Weever (_Trachinus vipera_), in the Suckers (_Lepidogastri_), a small family remarkable for the power they possess of attaching themselves to stones or rocks by means of an adhesive disk on the under surface of their bodies, and in several other fishes.

When imprisoned in an aquarium, few subjects of the deep display more intelligence or afford more entertainment than the little _Hippocampus brevirostris_, or Sea-Horse.

[Illustration: Sea-Horse.]

"While swimming about," says Mr. Lukis,[P] "it maintains a vertical position, but the tail, ready to grasp whatever meets it in the water, quickly entwines itself in any direction round the weeds, and, when fixed, the animal intently watches the surrounding objects, and darts at its prey with great dexterity. When two of them approach each other, they often twist their tails together, and struggle to separate or attach themselves to the weeds; this is done by the under part of their cheeks or chin, which is also used for raising the body when a new spot is wanted for the tail to fasten upon afresh."

[Footnote P: Yarrell, "British Fishes," 3rd edition, vol. ii. p. 396.]

"In captivity," says Mr. Gosse, "the manners of the Worm Pipe-Fish (_Syngnathus lambriciformis_), the smallest of our native species, are amusing and engaging. Its beautiful eyes move independently of each other, like those of the chameleon, and another point of resemblance to that animal our little pipe-fish presents in the prehensile character of its tail. It curves just the tip of this organ laterally round the stem or frond of some sea-weed and holds on by this half-inch or so, while the rest of its body roves to and fro, elevating and depressing the head and fore parts, and throwing the body into the most graceful curves. All the motions of the Pipe-fish manifest much intelligence. It is a timid little thing, retiring from the side of the glass at which it had been lying when one approaches, and hiding under the shadow of the sea-weeds, which I have put in, both to afford it shelter, and also to supply food in the numerous animalcules that inhabit these marine plants. Then it cautiously glides among their bushy fronds, and from under their shelter peeps with its brilliant eyes at the intruder as if wondering what he can be, drawing back gently at any alarming motion. In swimming, it is constantly throwing its body into elegant contortions and undulations; often it hangs nearly perpendicular with the tail near the surface; now and then it butts against the side of the vessel with reiterated blows of its nose, as if it could not make out why it should not go forward where it can see no impediment. Now it twists about as if it would tie its body into a love knot, then hangs motionless in some one of the 'lines of beauty' in which it has accidentally paused."

The family of the Pleuronectidæ or Flat-fishes recommends itself to our notice as much by the singularity of its form as by its usefulness to man. "The want of symmetry," says Yarrell, "so unusual in vertebrated animals, is the most striking and distinctive character of these fishes: the twisted head with both eyes on the same side, one higher than the other, not in the same vertical line, and often unequal in size; the mouth cleft awry, and the frequent want of uniformity in those fins that are in pairs, the pectoral and ventral fins of the under side being generally smaller; and the whole of the colour of the fish confined to one side, while the other side remains white, produce a grotesque appearance: yet a little consideration will prove that these various and seemingly obvious anomalies are perfectly in harmony with that station in nature which an animal possessing such conformation is appointed to fill.

"As birds are seen to occupy very different situations, some obtaining their food on the ground, others on trees, and not a few at various degrees of elevation in the air, so are fishes destined to reside in different depths of water. The flat-fishes and the various species of skate are, by their depressed form of body, admirably adapted to inhabit the lowest position, where they occupy the least space among their kindred fishes."

"Preferring sandy or muddy shores, the place of the flat-fish is close to the ground; where, hiding their bodies horizontally in the loose soil at the bottom, with the head only slightly elevated, an eye on the under side of the head would be useless; but as both eyes are placed on the upper surface, an extensive range of view is afforded in those various directions in which they may either endeavour to find suitable food or avoid dangerous enemies. Light, one great cause of colour, strikes on the upper surface only; the under surface, like that of most other fishes, remains perfectly colourless. Having little or no means of defence, had their colour been placed only above the lateral line on each side, in whatever position they moved their piebald appearance would have rendered them conspicuous objects to all their enemies. When near the ground, they swim slowly, maintaining their horizontal position; and the smaller pectoral and ventral fins, on the under side, are advantageous where there is so much less room for their action than with the larger fins that are above. When suddenly disturbed, they sometimes make a rapid shoot, changing their position from horizontal to vertical; and, if the observer happens to be opposite the white side, they may be seen to pass with the rapidity and flash of a meteor. Soon, however, they sink down again, resuming their previous motionless horizontal position, and are then distinguished with difficulty, owing to their great similarity in colour to the surface on which they rest."

The number of species of the flat-fishes diminishes as the degrees of northern latitude increase. In this country we have twenty-three species; at the parallel of Jutland there are thirteen; on the coast of Norway they are reduced to ten; in Iceland the number is but five, and in Greenland only three.

[Illustration: Halibut.]

Many of them attain a considerable size, particularly the Halibut (_Pleuronectes hippoglossus_). In April 1828 a specimen seven feet six inches long and three feet six inches broad was taken off the Isle of Man, and sent to Edinburgh market. Olafsen mentions that he saw one which measured five ells; and we are told by the Norwegian fishermen that a single halibut will sometimes cover a whole skiff. Let us, however, remember that these stories proceed from the country where monstrous krakens and sea-snakes are most frequently seen, and where the mists of the north seem to produce strange delusions of vision. At all events, the halibut is better entitled to the name of _maximus_ than its relation the Turbot, to which that epithet has been improperly applied by naturalists. The turbot, equally esteemed by the ancients and the moderns for the delicacy of its flesh, is often confounded in our markets with the halibut, but may be easily recognised by the large unequal and obtuse tubercles on its upper part.

[Illustration: Turbot.]

The number of turbot brought to Billingsgate within twelve months, up to a recent period, was 87,958. Though very considerable quantities of this fish are now taken on various parts of our own coasts, from the Orkneys to the Land's End, yet a preference is given to those caught by the Dutch fishermen, who are supposed to draw not less than 80,000_l._ for the supply of the London market alone. According to Mr. Low, it is rare along our most northern shores, but increases in numbers on proceeding to the south.

[Illustration: Sole.]

Next to the turbot, the Sole is reckoned the most delicate of the flat-fishes. It inhabits the sandy shore all round our coast, where it keeps close to the bottom, indiscriminately feeding on smaller testaceous animals, crustacea, annelides, radiata, and the spawn and fry of other fishes. It is found northward as far as the Baltic and the seas of Scandinavia, and southward along the shores of Spain, Portugal, and the Mediterranean. The consumption is enormous, for Mr. Bertram informs us that no less than 100,000,000 soles are annually brought to the London market.[Q] They seldom take any bait, and are caught almost entirely by trawling. The principal fishing-ground in England is along the south coast from Sussex to Devonshire, where the soles are much larger and considered otherwise superior to those of the north and east. On the Devonshire coast, the great fishing-station is at Brixham in Torbay, where the boats, using large trawling nets from thirty to thirty-six feet in beam, produce a continual supply.

[Footnote Q: We are told by the same author ("Harvest of the Seas," Murray, 1866) that 500,000 cod-fish, 25,000,000 mackerel, 35,000,000 plaice, and 200,000,000 haddocks, &c., form the yearly supply of the metropolis, which, besides this immense number of white-fish, consumes 50,000,000 red herrings and 1,600,000 dried cod. These, with the addition of Molluscous shell-fish (oysters, &c.) to the amount of 920,000,000, and a daily demand for 10,000 lobsters during the season, afford an instructive indication of what must be the requirement of the whole population of the United Kingdom as regards fish food.

The Report of the Commissioners appointed in the year 1863 to enquire into the sea-fisheries of the United Kingdom gives us the gratifying intelligence that the number of fishermen in Great Britain has nearly doubled within the last twenty years, while the boats are increasing in number and size. No class of the population is said to be in a more flourishing condition; and this prosperity is no doubt mainly due to the railroads, which have opened throughout the whole kingdom a ready market for the produce of the seas. In Ireland, however, there has been a diminution of 10,583 boats and 52,127 men within the same time; a consequence of the famine of 1848, and subsequent emigration.]

[Illustration: Plaice.]

The Plaice and Flounder, though far inferior to the sole in quality, are still in great request as articles of food. On the English coast, the plaice are obtained in abundance on all sandy banks and muddy grounds, wherever either lines or trawl-nets can be used. On the sandy flats of the Solway Frith, they are taken by the fishermen and their families wading in the shoal water with bare feet. When a fish is felt, it is pressed by the foot firmly against the bottom until it can be secured by the hand and transferred to the basket. Long practice gives the dexterity which renders this kind of fishing successful.

In some parts of the North of Europe, where from the rocky nature of the soil the sea is remarkably transparent, plaice and some other flat-fish of large size are taken by dropping down upon them from a boat a doubly-barbed short spear, heavily leaded, to carry it with velocity to the bottom, with a line attached to it, by which the fish, when transfixed, is hauled up.

[Illustration: The Flounder.]

The Flounder, one of the most common of the flat-fish, is found in the sea and near the mouths of large streams all round our coast,

## particularly where the bottom is soft, whether of sand, clay, or mud. It

also ascends the rivers, and is caught in considerable quantities from Deptford to Richmond by Thames fishermen, who, with the assistance of an apprentice, use a net of a particular sort, called a tuck-sean. "One end of this net," says Yarrell, "is fixed for a short time by an anchor or grapple, and its situation marked by a floating buoy; the boat is then rowed or rather sculled by the apprentice in a circle, the fisherman near the stern handing out and clearing the net: when the circle is completed and a space enclosed, the net is hauled in near the starting-point in a direction across the fixed end."

The Sail-fluke, a species of flat-fish common among the Orkneys, where it is highly prized as an article of food, its flesh being firm and white, is remarkable for its curious habit of coming ashore spontaneously, with its tail erected above the water, like a boat under sail, whence it has derived its name. This it does generally in calm weather, and on sandy shores, and the country people residing near such places train their dogs to catch it. In North Ronaldshay, the northernmost island of the group, a considerable supply is obtained in an original manner: thus described in a letter from a resident inserted in Yarrell's "British Fishes:" "In the winter and early spring, a pair of black-headed gulls take possession of the South Bay, drive away all interlopers, and may be seen at daybreak every morning, beating from side to side, on the wing, and never both in one place, except in the act of crossing as they pass. The sail-fluke skims the ridge of the wave towards the shore with its tail raised over its back, and when the wave recedes is left on the sand, into which it burrows so suddenly and completely that, though I have watched its approach, only once have I succeeded in finding its burrow.

"The gull, however, has a surer eye, and casting like a hawk pounces on the fluke, from which, by one stroke of its bill, it extracts the liver. If not disturbed, the gull no sooner gorges the luscious morsel than it commences dragging the fish to some outlying rock, where he and his consort may discuss it at leisure. By robbing the black backs, I have had the house supplied daily with this excellent fish, in weather during which no fishing-boat could put to sea. Close to the beach of South Bay, a stone wall has been raised to shelter the crops from the sea-spray. Behind this we posted a smart lad, who kept his eye on the soaring gulls. The moment one of the birds made its well-known swoop, the boy rushed to the sea-strand shouting out with all his might. He was usually in time to scare the gull away and secure the fluke, but almost in every case with the liver torn out. If the gull by chance succeeded in carrying his prey off the rock, he and his partner set up a triumphant cackling, as if deriding the disappointed lad."

[Illustration: Thornback.]

The Rays resemble the side-swimmers by the flatness of their form, but differ widely from them in many other particulars. Like the sharks and sturgeons, they belong to the cartilaginous fishes, and as their branchiæ adhere to the cells, these respiratory membranes are not furnished with a gill-cover, but communicate freely with the water by means of five spiracles on either side. More unsightly fishes can hardly be conceived. The rhomboidal broad body, the long narrow tail frequently furnished with two and sometimes three small fins, and mostly armed with one or more rows of sharp spines along its whole length, the dirty colour, and the thick coat of slime with which it is covered, render them pre-eminently disgusting. Their mode of defending themselves is very effectual, and forms a striking contrast to the helplessness of the flat fish. The point of the nose and the base of the tail are bent upwards towards each other, and the upper surface of the body being then concave, the tail is lashed about in all directions over it, and the rows of sharp spines frequently inflict severe wounds.

Eleven species of rays are found on the British coasts, some, like the skates, with a perfectly smooth skin; others, like the thornback, with an upper surface studded with spines, and some, like the sting-ray, with a tail still more powerfully armed with a long serrated spine: a formidable weapon, which the fish strikes with the swiftness of an arrow into its prey or enemy, when with its winding tail it makes the capture secure. The lacerations inflicted by the tropical sting-rays produce the most excruciating tortures. An Indian who accompanied Richard Schomburgk on his travels through Guiana, being hit by one of these fishes while fording a river, tottered to the bank, where he fell upon the ground and rolled about on the sand with compressed lips in an agony of pain. But no tear started from the eye, no cry of anguish issued from the breast, of the stoical savage. An Indian boy wounded in the some manner, but less able to master his emotions, howled fearfully, and flung himself upon the sand, biting it in the paroxysm of his anguish. Although both had been hit in the foot, they felt the severest pain in the loins, in the region of the heart, and in the arm-pits. A robust man, wounded by a sting-ray, died in Demarara under the most dreadful convulsions.

The rays are very voracious; their food consists of any sort of fish, mollusc, annelide, or crustacean, that they can catch. So powerful are their muscles and jaws that they are able to crush the strong shell of a crab with the greatest ease. Even in our seas they attain a considerable size. Thomas Willoughby makes mention of a single skate of two hundred pounds' weight, which was sold in the fish market at Cambridge to the cook of St. John's College, and was found sufficient for the dinner of a society, consisting of more than a hundred and twenty persons. Dr. G. Johnston measured a sharp-nosed ray at Berwick, which was seven feet nine inches long and eight feet three inches broad. But our European rays are far from equalling the colossal dimensions of the sea-devil of the Pacific. This terrific monster swims fast, and often appears on the surface of the ocean, where its black unwieldy back looks like a huge stone projecting above the waters. It attains a breadth of twelve or fifteen feet, and Lesson was presented by a fisherman of Borabora with a tail five feet long. The Society Islanders catch the hideous animal with harpoons, and make use of its rough skin as rasps or files in the manufacture of their wooden utensils.

Creatures so voracious and well armed as the rays would have attained a dangerous supremacy in the maritime domains had they equalled most other fishes in fecundity. Fortunately for their neighbours, they seldom produce more than one young at a time, which, as in the sharks, is enclosed in a four-cornered capsule ending in slender points, but not, as in the former, produced into long filaments.

Thus nature has in this case set bounds to the increase of a race which else might have destroyed the balance of marine existence; in most fishes, however, she has been obliged to provide against the danger of extinction by a prodigal abundance of new germs. If the cod did not annually produce more than nine millions of eggs, and the sturgeon more than seven; if the flat-fish, mackerels, and herrings, did not multiply by hundreds of thousands, they could not possibly maintain themselves against the vast number of their enemies. "Not one egg too much," every one will say who considers that of all the myriads of germs which are deposited on the shallow sand-banks and shores to be quickened by the fructifying warmth of the sun, not one in a hundred comes to life, as fishes and molluscs, crabs and radiata, devour the spawn with equal voracity; that a thousand dangers await the young defenceless fry, since everywhere in the oceanic realms no other right is known than that of the stronger; and that, finally, the insatiable rapacity of man is continually extirpating millions on millions of the full-grown fishes. But if very few of this much-persecuted race die a natural death, a life of liberty makes them some amends for their violent end. The tortured cart-horse or the imprisoned nightingale would, if they could reflect, willingly exchange their hard lot and joyless existence for the free life of the independent fish, who, from the greater simplicity of his structure, his want of higher sensibilities, his excellent digestion, and the more equal temperature of the element in which he lives, remains unmolested by many of the diseases to which the warm-blooded and

## particularly the domestic animals are subject.

[Illustration: Dory.]

CHAP. XIII.

CRUSTACEA.

CRABS--LOBSTERS.

How are they distinguished from the Insects?--Barnacles and Acorn-shells.--Siphonostomata.--Entomostraca.--King-Crab. --Edriophthalmia.--Sandhoppers.--Thoracostraca.--Compound Eye of the higher Crustaceans.--Respiratory Apparatus of the Decapods.--Digestive Organs.--Chelæ or Pincers.--Distribution of Crabs.--Land Crabs.--The Calling Crab.--Modifications of the Legs in different species.--The Pinna and Pinnotheres.--Hermit Crabs.--The Lobster.--The Cocoa-nut Crab.--The Shrimp.--Moulting Process.--Metamorphoses of Crabs.--Victims and Enemies of the Crustaceans.--Their Fecundity.--Marine Spiders and Insects.

[Illustration: Barnacle.]

[Illustration: Balanus ovularis.]

[Illustration: Development of Balanus balanoides.--(Acorn-shell.)

A. Earliest form. B. Larva after second moult. C. Side view of the same. D. Stage immediately preceding the loss of activity. _a._ Stomach. _b._ Nucleus of future attachment.]

The Crustaceans were included by Linnæus among his insects, but their internal structure presents such numerous and important differences that modern naturalists have raised them to the dignity of a separate class. They have indeed, in common with the insects, an articulated body, generally cased with hard materials; they are like them provided with jointed legs, with antennæ or feelers, and their organs of mastication are similarly formed; but insects breathe atmospheric air through lateral pores or tracheæ, while the crustaceans, being either aquatic animals or constantly frequenting very damp places, have a branchial or a tegumentary respiration. The perfect insect undergoes no further change; the crustacean, on the contrary, increases in size with every successive year. The higher crustacean possesses a heart, which propels the blood, after it has been aërated in the gills, to every part of the body; in the insect the circulation of the blood is by no means so highly organised. On the other hand many of the insects are far superior in point of intelligence to even the best endowed crustaceans, for here we find no parental care, no mutual affection, no joint labours for the welfare of a large community, no traces of an amiable disposition, but frequent outbursts of an irascible and sanguinary temper. Though the whole of the Crustacea are formed after one and the same general type, and the same fundamental idea may be traced throughout all their tribes, yet the rings of which their body is composed, and the limbs or appendages attached to these segments, undergo such extensive modifications of structure in the various orders into which the class has been divided that even the eye of science has with difficulty made out the true nature of many of their lowest forms. Who, for instance, judging from outward appearances alone, would suppose that the Barnacles and Acorn-shells which he sees riveted to the rock or to a piece of floating timber were relations of the crab or lobster; but a view of their early forms at once points out their real character, for then they appear as active little animals possessing three pairs of legs and a pair of compound eyes, and having the body covered with an expanded shield like that of many of the lower crustaceans. After going through a series of metamorphoses, these larvæ, tired of a roaming life, attach themselves by their head, a portion of which becomes excessively elongated into the "peduncle" of the Barnacles, whilst in the Balani or acorn-shells it expands into a broad disk of adhesion. The multivalve shell is gradually formed, the eyes are cast away as being no longer needed, and the now useless feet are replaced by six pairs of extremely useful _cirrhi_, long, slender, many-jointed, tendril-like appendages fringed with delicate filaments and covered with vibratile cilia. These cirrhi, which resemble a plume of purple feathers, and from whose peculiar character the name of the group, Cirrhipoda, is derived, are constantly in motion as long as they are bathed in water, projecting outwards and expanding into an oval concave net, then retracting inwards, and closing upon whatever may have come within their reach. They are so judiciously placed that any small animal which becomes entangled within them can rarely escape, and is at once conveyed to the mouth. The currents produced in the water by their perpetual activity serve also to aërate the blood, so that these delicate organs act both as gills and as prehensile arms. In spite of their sessile condition, the Cirrhipeds have not been left without protection against hostile attacks, for at the approach of danger they shrink within their shell, and close its orifice against a host of hungry intruders.

Their various families are widely spread over the seas. It is well known that the barnacles frequently attach themselves in such vast numbers to ships' bottoms as materially to obstruct their way, and the acorn-shells often line the coasts for miles and miles with their large white scurfy patches. The Coronulæ settle so profusely on the skin of the Greenland whale as often to hide the colour of its skin, while the Tubicinellæ exclusively occur on the huge cetaceans of the South Sea. Some of the larger sea-acorns are highly esteemed as articles of food. The Chinese, after eating the animal of _Balanus tintinnabulum_ with salt and vinegar, use the shell, which is about two or three inches high and an inch in diameter, as a lamp, and the flesh of _Balanus psittacus_ on the southern parts of the South American coast is said to equal in richness and delicacy that of the crab.

While the Cirrhipeds grasp their prey as in a living net, the Siphonostomata lead a parasitic life chiefly upon fishes, sucking their juices with a bloodthirsty proboscis. Some (Argulus, Caligus) wander about freely on the body of their victims as grazing animals on their pasture grounds, or even make excursions in the water, where they will turn over and over several times in succession like mountebanks; others (Lerneæ), after having, like the barnacles, indulged in a vagabond existence in their first youth, remain ever after clinging to the spot on which they originally settled, and where their body undergoes such remarkable transformations that not a vestige of the crustacean structure which characterised their erratic life remains.

As we continue to proceed from the lower to the higher forms, we find, on the next stage of crustacean life, the numerous families of the Entomostraca; some bristly-footed (Lophyropoda), with a small number of legs and with respiratory organs attached to the parts in the neighbourhood of the mouth, others gill-footed (Branchiopoda), with numerous foliaceous legs, serving both for respiration and swimming. Some of these creatures, which are generally of such minute size as to be only just visible to the naked eye, have an unprotected body (Branchipus), but generally they are enclosed within a horny or shelly casing, which sometimes closely resembles a bivalve shell in shape and in the mode of junction of its parts, whilst in other instances it forms a kind of buckler, an opening being left behind, through which the members project.

[Illustration: King-Crab.]

Though enjoying a royal title, the King-crabs, or Limuli, occupy in reality but a low rank among the crustaceans, and are hardly superior in organisation to the Entomostraca. They are of large size, sometimes attaining the length of two feet, and of a very singular structure, the bases of the legs performing the part of jaws. The best-known species comes from the Moluccas, where they are often seen slowly swimming in the sheltered bays, or still more slowly crawling along upon the sandy shores.

[Illustration: Sandhopper.]

In the Edriophthalmia are included the lower crustaceans that have no carapace, and whose thorax and abdomen are distinctly composed of articulated segments. The numerous legs are variously formed in the different genera for springing, walking, or swimming; and respiration is executed by certain portions of the extremities, modified for this purpose in their structure. To this order belong among others the saltatorial sandhoppers (Talitrus), which so frequently jump up before our feet when walking on the wet sea-sand; the ill-famed Cheluræ and Linnoriæ, whose devastations in submerged timber almost rival those of the ship-worm, and the parasitical Cyami, which gnaw deep holes into the skin of the whale. The sandhoppers are extremely frequent on the shores of the arctic seas, where they emulate the tropical ants in their speedy removal of decaying animal substances. Thus Captain Holböll relates that, having enclosed a piece of shark's flesh in a basket, and let it down to a depth of seventy-five fathoms, in the Greenland sea, he by this means caught within two hours six quarts of these little creatures, while a vast number still followed the basket as it was hauled up.

[Illustration: Chelura terebrans.]

[Illustration: Limnoria lignorum.]

[Illustration: Square facets of Scyllarus.]

[Illustration: Hexagonal facets of Squilla.]

As the lower crustaceans offer but few points of interest to the general reader, they required but a few words of notice; but the highest order of the class, the Thoracostraca, thus named from the carapace which covers their thorax, so that only the abdomen presents an annular structure, may justly claim a more ample description. The preceding orders had either sessile eyes or none at all; here the movable eyes are fixed on stalks and of a compound structure like those of the insects; each ocular globe consisting of a number of distinct parallel columns, every one of which is provided with its own crystalline lens, receives its separate impression of light, and is thus in itself a perfect eye. Approaches to this structure are seen in some of the lower crustaceans; but here the "ocelli," as these minute individual eyes have been designated, are very numerous. They are at once recognised, under even a low magnifying power, by the facetted appearance of the surface of the compound eye, the facets being either square (Scyllari, &c.) or more commonly hexagonal (Paguri, Squillæ, &c). The auditory apparatus is likewise highly developed; the sense of smell is known to be very acute; and the antennæ are delicate organs of touch.

The Thoracostraca are subdivided into the small group of the Stomatopoda, whose branchiæ are external and the feet prehensile or formed for swimming, and the far more numerous and important Decapods, which are either long-tailed like the scyllarus or short-tailed like the crab. In these the branchiæ no longer float in the water, but are enclosed in two chambers, situated one at each side of the under surface of the broad shelly plate which covers the back of the animal. Each of these chambers is provided with two apertures, one in the front near the jaws, the other behind.

[Illustration: Scyllarus equinoxialis.]

The disposition of the anterior or efferent orifice varies but little; but in the long-tailed species the afferent or posterior orifice is a wide slit at the basis of the feet, while in the short-tailed kinds it forms a small transverse aperture generally placed almost immediately in front of the first pair of ambulatory extremities. By means of this formation, the short-tailed decapods or crabs, like those fishes that are provided with a narrow opening to their gill covers, are enabled to exist much longer out of the water than the long-tailed lobsters. Some of them even spend most of their time on land; and, still better to adapt them for a terrestrial life, the internal surfaces of the branchial caverns are lined with a spongy texture, and the gill branches separated from each other by hard partitions, so as to prevent them from collapsing after a long penury of water and thus completely stopping the circulation. While in fishes the water that serves for respiration flows from the front backwards, so as not to impede their motions, we find in the interior of the branchial cavity of the decapods a large valve attached to the second pair of maxillary feet, which, continually falling and rising, occasions a rapid current from behind forwards in the water with which the cavity is filled, a structure perfectly harmonising with their retrograde or sidelong movements.

The digestive apparatus of the decapods is of a very complicated structure. The mouth is here furnished with at least eight pieces or pairs of jaws, which pass the food through an extremely short gullet into a stomach of considerable size. This stomach is rendered curious by having within certain cartilaginous appendages, to which strong grinding-teeth are attached. These are placed at the outlet of the stomach, so that the aliment, after being subjected to the action of the jaws, is again more perfectly comminuted by the stomach-teeth before entering the digestive tube. The different pieces composing the masticatory apparatus of the stomach vary considerably in the different genera, and even in the several species of the same genus; but in every case they are always singularly in harmony with the kind of food taken and the general habits of the animal.

To enable the decapods to seize their victims or to defend themselves against their enemies, their anterior thoracic extremities generally assume the form of "chelæ," claws, or pincers of considerable strength, armed with teeth or sharp hooks, which give them increased powers of prehension. This form results mainly from the state of extreme development in which the penultimate articulation frequently occurs, and its assumption of the shape of a finger by the prolongation of one of its inferior angles. Against the finger-like process thus produced, which is of great strength, and quite immovable, the last articulation can be brought to bear with immense force, as it is put into motion by a muscular mass of great size, and in relation with the extraordinary development of the penultimate articulation. In most cases only the first pair of legs is converted into these formidable weapons, but in the Dromiæ, which are very common in the warmer seas, we find the two posterior pairs of legs, which are of a much smaller size, and raised above the plane of the others, similarly armed. These posterior claws, however, are not intended for active warfare, but merely for strategical purposes, as they serve to hold fast the pieces of sponges, shells, medusæ, and other marine productions, under whose cover the wily robber approaches and entraps his prey.

[Illustration: Dromia Vulgaris.]

While the lower crustaceans abound in the polar seas, the crabs are completely wanting in those desolate regions; their number increases with the warmer temperature of the waters, and attains its maximum in the tropical zone. Here we find the most remarkable and various forms, here they attain a size unknown in our seas; and here they do not, as with us, inhabit solely the salt waters, but also people the brooks and rivers, or even constantly sojourn on land,--as, for instance, the _Thelphusæ_ and _Gecarcini_. There are even some species of land-crabs that suffocate when dipped into water. They breathe indeed through branchiæ, but the small quantity of oxygen dissolved in water does not suffice for the wants of their active respiration. They generally live in the shades of the damp forests, often at a great distance from the sea, concealing themselves in holes. At breeding time they generally seek the shore for the purpose of washing off their spawn, and depositing it in the sand, and no obstruction will then make them deviate from the straight path. They feed on vegetable substances, and are reckoned very excellent food. When taken, they will seize the person's finger with their claw, and endeavour to escape, leaving the claw behind, which for some time after it has been separated from the body, continues to give the finger a friendly squeeze. In the dusk of the evening they quit their holes, and may then be seen running about with great swiftness.

[Illustration: Jamaica Land-Crab.]

All sandy and muddy coasts of the tropical seas, affording sufficient protection against a heavy sea, swarm with crabs. In the East and West Indies the Gelasimi bore in every direction circular holes in the moist black soil of the coast. One of the claws of these remarkable creatures is much larger than the other, so as sometimes to surpass in size the whole remainder of the body. They make use of it as a door, to close the entrance of their dwelling, and when running swiftly along, carry it upright over the head, so that it seems to beckon like an outstretched hand. One might fancy the crab moved it as in derision of its pursuers, telling them by pantomimic signs, "Catch me if you can!"

[Illustration: Large-Clawed Calling-Crab.]

As soon as the ebbing flood lays bare the swampy grounds of the mangrove woods, myriads of animals are seen wallowing in the pestiferous mud. Here a fish jumps about, there a holothuria crawls, and crabs run along by thousands in every direction. The black mud along the coast of Borneo assumes quite a brilliant blue tinge, when, at low water, during the heat of the day, the cœrulean Gelasimi come forth to feed.

[Illustration: Calling-Crab of Ceylon.]

The Venetian lagoons also harbour a vast number of the common Shore-Crab (_Portunus Mænas_), the catching of which affords a profitable employment to the inhabitants of those swampy regions. Whole cargoes are sent to Istria, where they are used as bait for anchovies. The fishermen gather them a short time before they cast their shell, and preserve them in baskets, until the moulting process has been effected, when they are reckoned a delicacy even on the best tables. On attempting to seize this crab, it runs rapidly sideways, and conceals itself in the mud; but when unsuccessful, it raises itself with a menacing mien, beats its claws noisily together, as if in defiance of the enemy, and prepares for a valiant defence, like a true knight.

The most valuable short-tailed crustacean of the North Sea is undoubtedly the Great Crab (_Cancer pagurus_), which attains a weight of from four to five pounds, and is consumed by thousands in the summer, when it is in season and heaviest. It is caught in wicker-baskets, arranged so as to permit an easy entrance, while egress is not to be thought of.

The legs of the crabs are very differently formed in various species. In those which have been called sea-spiders they are very long, thin, and weak, so that the animal swims badly, and is a slow and uncertain pedestrian. For greater security it therefore generally seeks a greater depth, where, concealed among the sea-weeds, it wages war with annelides, planarias, and small mollusks. Sea-spiders are often found on the oyster-banks, and considered injurious by the fishermen, who unmercifully destroy them whenever they get hold of them.

In other species the legs are short, muscular, and powerful, so as rapidly to carry along the comparatively light body. The tropical land-crabs and the genera _Ocypoda_ and _Grapsus_, which form the link between the former and the real sea-crabs, are particularly distinguished in this respect.

The Rider or Racer (_Ocypoda cursor_), who is found on the coasts of Syria and Barbary, and abounds at Cape de Verde, owes his name to his swiftness, which is such that even a man on horseback is said not to be able to overtake him. The West Indian ocypodas dig holes three or four feet deep, immediately above high-water mark, and leave them after dusk. Towards the end of October they retire further inland, and bury themselves for the winter in similar holes, the opening of which they carefully conceal.

[Illustration: American Sand-Crab.]

In the Portuni, or true Sea-crabs, finally, we find the hind pair of legs flattened like fins, so that they would cut but a sorry figure on the land, but are all the better able to row about in their congenial element.

[Illustration: Spotted Fin-Crab.]

A strange peculiarity of many crabs is the quantity of parasites they carry along with them on their backs. Many marine productions, both of a vegetable and animal nature, have their birth and grow to beauty on the shell of the sea-spider. Corallines, sponges, zoophytes, algæ, may thus be found, and balani occasionally cover the entire upper surface of the body of the crab. "All the examples of the _Inachus Dorsettensis_ which I have taken," says the distinguished naturalist, Mr. W. Thompson of Belfast, "were invested with sponge, which generally covers over the body, arms, and legs; algæ and zoophytes likewise spring from it." In this extraneous matter some of the smaller zoophytes find shelter, and, together with the other objects, render the capture of the _Inachus Dorsettensis_ interesting far beyond its own acquisition. In Mr. Hyndman's collection, there is a sea-spider carrying on its back an oyster much larger than itself, and covered besides with numerous barnacles. Like Atlas, the poor creature groaned under a world.

The extraneous matters which so many crabs carry along with them are, however, far from being always a useless burden; they are often a warlike stratagem, under cover of which the sly crustacean entraps many a choice morsel. Thus Bennett witnessed at Otaheite the proceedings of an interesting Hyas species, which disguised itself by investing its body with a covering of decayed vegetable substances and coral-sand. The better to ensnare its prey, the back was covered with rigid and incurved bristles, calculated to retain the extraneous substances, while the short and well concealed forceps-claws were ready for the attack, and the ophthalmic peduncles, curving upward to raise the eyes above the pile of materials, gave the wily crab the great advantage of seeing without being seen. As soon as an unfortunate mollusk, unsuspicious of evil, approached the lurking ruffian, he darted upon it like an arrow, and, ere it could recover its presence of mind, was busy tearing it to pieces.

[Illustration: Pea-Crab.]

If many crabs are burdened with small animals and plants, others live parasitically in the shells of mollusks. Thus the small _Pinnotheres veterum_ claims the hospitality of the Pinna, a large bivalve of the Mediterranean. The ancients supposed that this was a friendly connection, an _entente cordiale_, formed for mutual defence: that the Pinna, being destitute of eyes, and thus exposed when he opened his shell to the attacks of the cuttle-fish and other enemies, was warned of their approach by his little lodger, upon which he immediately closed his shell and both were safe. Unfortunately, there is not a word of truth in the whole story. The sole reason why the Pinnotheres takes up its abode under a stranger's roof is the softness of its own integuments, which otherwise would leave it utterly defenceless; nor does the Pinna show the least sign of affection for its guest, who, on returning from an excursion, often finds it very difficult to slip again into the shell.

[Illustration: Pinna Augustana.]

According to Mr. Thompson, the _Modiola vulgaris_, a species of mussel very common on the Irish coast, almost always harbours several parasitic crabs (_Pinnotheres pisum_). At Heligoland, Dr. Oetker, to whom we are indebted for the best work on that interesting island, scarce ever found a modiola without several guests of this description, while he never could find any in oysters, mussels, and other nearly related species. What may the reason be of either this predilection or that desertion?

The numerous family of the Paguri, or Hermit crabs, is also condemned by its formation to lead a parasitic and robber-life. The fore part of the body is indeed, as in other crabs, armed with claws and covered with a shield, but ends in a long soft tail provided with one or two small hooks. How then are the poor creatures to help themselves? The hind part is not formed for swimming, and its weight prevents them from running. Thus nothing remains for them but to look about them for some shelter, and this is afforded them by several conchiform shells, _buccina_, _neritæ_, in which they so tenaciously insert their hooked tails, as if both were grown together. So long as they are young and feeble, they content themselves with such shells as they find empty on the strand, but when grown to maturity, they attack living specimens, seize with their sharp claws the snail, ere it can withdraw into its shell, and after devouring its flesh, creep without ceremony into the conquered dwelling, which fits them like a coat when they take a walk, and the mouth of which they close when at rest with their largest forceps, in the same manner as the original possessor used his operculum or lid. How remarkable that an animal should thus find in another creature belonging to a totally different class, the completion, as it were, of its being, and be indebted to it for the protecting cover which its own skin is unable to secrete!

[Illustration: Diogenes Hermit Crab.]

When the dwelling of the pagurus becomes inconveniently narrow, the remedy is easy, for appropriate sea-shells abound wherever hermit crabs exist. They are found on almost every coast, and every new scientific voyage makes us acquainted with new species. According to Quoy and Gaimard, they are particularly numerous at the Ladrones, New Guinea, and Timor. The strand of the small island of Kewa, in Coupang Bay, was entirely covered with them. In the heat of the day they seek the shade of the bushes; but as soon as the cool of evening approaches, they come forth by thousands. Although they make all large snail-houses answer their purposes, they seem in this locality to prefer the large Sea Nerites.

The famous East Indian Cocoa-nut Crab (_Birgus latro_), a kind of intermediate link between the short and long tailed crabs, bears a great resemblance to the paguri. It is said to climb the palm-trees, for the sake of detaching the heavy nuts; but Mr. Darwin, who attentively observed the animal on the Keeling Islands, tells us that it merely lives upon those that spontaneously fall from the tree. To extract its nourishment from the hard case, it shows an ingenuity which is one of the most wonderful instances of animal instinct. It must first of all be remarked, that its front pair of legs is terminated by very strong and heavy pincers, the last pair by others, narrow and weak. After having selected a nut fit for its dinner, the crab begins its operations by tearing the husk, fibre by fibre, from that end under which the three eye-holes are situated; it then hammers upon one of them with its heavy claws, until an opening is made. Hereupon it turns round, and by the aid of its posterior pincers, extracts the white albuminous substance. It inhabits deep burrows, where it accumulates surprising quantities of picked fibres of cocoa-nut husks, on which it rests as on a bed. Its habits are diurnal; but every night it is said to pay a visit to the sea, no doubt for the purpose of moistening its branchiæ. It is very good to eat, living as it does on choice vegetable substances; and the great mass of fat, accumulated under the tail of the larger ones, sometimes yields, when melted, as much as a quart of limpid oil. Thus our taking possession of the Keeling Islands, as a coaling station for the steamers from Australia to Ceylon, bodes no good to the Birgus.

The long tail, which the paguri sedulously conceal in shells, serves the shrimps and lobsters as their chief organ of locomotion, for although these creatures have well-formed legs, they make but slow work of it when they attempt to crawl. But nothing can equal the rapidity with which they dart backwards through the water, by suddenly contracting their tail. Thus the Lobster makes leaps of twenty feet at one single bound, and the little shrimp equals it fully in velocity in proportion to its size, and belongs unquestionably to the most active of the denizens of the ocean. It swarms in incalculable numbers on the sandy shores of the North Sea, where it is caught in nets attached to a long cross pole, which the fishermen, walking knee-deep in the water, push along before them. Boiled shrimps are a well known delicacy; and the _Squilla Mantis_ of the Mediterranean, which resembles our common shrimp in outer form, but essentially differs from it in the formation of its branchiæ, which float freely in the water, attached to the abdominal legs, holds an equal rank in the estimation of the South Europeans.

[Illustration: Crustaceans and Oysters.]

[Illustration: Spotted Mantis Crab.]

But of all crustaceans, none approaches the Lobster in delicacy of taste. This creature, the epicure's delight, loves to dwell in the deep clear waters along bold rocky shores, where it is taken in wicker baskets, or with small nets attached to iron hoops. About two millions of lobsters are annually imported from Norway, although they are also found in great abundance along the Scottish and Irish coasts. Thus, considering their high price, they form a considerable article of trade; and yet they are far from equalling in importance the minute Herring-crab (_Cancer halecum_), which, by forming the chief nourishment of that invaluable fish, renders in an indirect way incalculable services to man.

The lobster breeds in the summer months, depositing many thousands of eggs in the sand, and leaving them there to be hatched by the sun. But few, as may easily be imagined, live to attain a size befitting them to appear in red livery on our tables. Like all crustaceans, the lobster casts its shell annually, and with such perfection, that the discarded garment, with all its appendages, perfectly resembles the living animal. The process is curious enough to deserve a few lines of description.

When towards autumn, the time of casting the shell approaches, the lobster retires to a silent nook, like a pious hermit to his cell, and fasts several days. The shell thus detaches itself gradually from the emaciated body, and a new and tender cuticle forms underneath. The old dress seems now, however, to plague the lobster very much, to judge by the efforts he makes to sever all remaining connection with it. Soon the harness splits right through the back, like the cleft bark of a tree, or a ripe seed-husk, and opens a wide gate to liberty. After much tugging and wriggling, the legs, tail, and claws gradually follow the body. The claws give the lobster most trouble; but he is well aware that perseverance generally wins the day, and never ceases till the elastic mass, which can be drawn out like india-rubber, and instantly resumes its ordinary shape, has been forced through the narrow passage. It can easily be supposed that, after such a violent struggle for freedom, the lobster is not a little exhausted. Feeling his weakness, and the very insufficient protection afforded him by his soft covering, he bashfully retires from all society until his hardened case allows him to mix again with his friends on terms of equality, for he well knows how inclined they are to bite and devour a softer brother.

The facility with which the crustacea cast off their legs, and even their heavy claws, when they have been wounded in one of these organs or alarmed at thunder, is most remarkable. Without the least appearance of pain, they then continue to run along upon their remaining legs. After some time a new limb grows out of the old stump, but never attains the size of the original limb.

At the beginning of the