CHAPTER XVII

CAVALLAS AND PAMPANOS

=THE Pampanos: Carangidæ.=—We next take up the great family of Pampanos, _Carangidæ_, distinguished from the _Scombridæ_ as a whole by the shorter, deeper body, the fewer and larger vertebræ, and by the loss of the provision for swift movement in the open sea characteristic of the mackerels and their immediate allies. A simple mark of the _Carangidæ_ is the presence of two separate spines in front of the anal fin. These spines are joined to the fin in the young. All of the species undergo considerable changes with age, and almost all are silvery in color with metallic blue on the back.

Most like the true mackerel are the "leather-jackets," or "runners," forming the genera _Scomberoides_ and _Oligoplites_. _Scomberoides_ of the Old World has the body scaly, long, slender, and fitted for swift motion; _Scomberoides sancti-petri_ is a widely diffused species, and others are found in Polynesia. In the New World genus _Oligoplites_ the scales are reduced to linear ridges imbedded in the skin at different angles. _Oligoplites saurus_ is a common dry and bony fish abounding in the West Indies and ranging north in summer to Cape Cod.

_Naucrates ductor_, the pilot-fish, or romero, inhabits the open sea, being taken—everywhere rarely—in Europe, the West Indies, Hawaii, and Japan. It is marked by six black cross-bands. Its tail has a keel, and it reaches a length of about two feet. In its development it undergoes considerable change, its first dorsal fin being finally reduced to disconnected spines.

The amber-fishes, forming the genus _Seriola_, are rather robust fishes, with the anal fin much shorter than the soft dorsal. The sides of the tail have a low, smooth keel. From a yellow streak obliquely across the head in some species they receive their Spanish name of coronado. The species are numerous, found in all warm seas, of fair quality as food, and range in length from two to six feet.

_Seriola dorsalis_ is the noted yellow-tail of California, valued by anglers for its game qualities. It comes to the Santa Barbara Islands in early summer. _Seriola zonata_ is the rudder-fish, or shark's pilot, common on our New England coast. The banded young, abundant off Cape Cod, lose their marks with age. _Seriola hippos_ is the "samson-fish" of Australia. _Seriola lalandi_ is the great amber-fish of the West Indies, occasionally venturing farther northward, and _Seriola dumerili_ the amber-jack, or coronado, of the Mediterranean. The deep-bodied medregal (_Seriola fasciata_) is also taken in the West Indies, as is also the high-finned _Seriola rivoliana_. Species very similar to these occur in Hawaii and Japan, where they are known as _Ao_, or bluefishes. _Seriola lata_ is fossil in the mountains of Tuscany.

The runner, _Elegatis bipinnulatus_, differs from _Seriola_ in having a finlet behind dorsal and anal. It is found in almost all warm seas, ranging north once in a while to Long Island.

The mackerel scads (_Decapterus_) have also a finlet, and on the posterior part of the body the lateral line is shielded with bony plates. In size and form these little fishes much resemble small mackerel, and they are much valued as food wherever abundant. _Decapterus punclatus_, known also as cigar-fish and round-robin, frequently visits our Atlantic coasts from the West Indies, where it is abundant. _Decapterus russelli_ is the _Maruaji_, highly valued in Japan for its abundance, while _Decapterus muroadsi_ is the Japanese muroaji.

_Megalaspis cordyla_ abounds in the East Indies and Polynesia. It has many finlets, and the bony plates on the lateral line are developed to an extraordinary degree.

In _Trachurus_ the finlets are lost and the bony plates extend the whole length of the lateral line. The species known as saurel and wrongly called horse-mackerel are closely related and some of them very widely distributed.

_Trachurus trachurus_ common in Europe, extends to Japan where it is the abundant maaji. _Trachurus mediterraneus_ is common in southern Europe and _Trachurus symmetricus_ in California. _Trachurus picturatus_ of Madeira is much the same as the last named, and there is much question as to the right names and proper limits of all these species.

In _Trachurops_ the bony plates are lacking on the anterior half of the body, and there is a peculiar nick and projection on the lower part of the anterior edge of the shoulder-girdle. _Trachurops crumenophthalma_, the goggler, or big-eyed scad, ranges widely in the open sea and at Hawaii, as the _Akule_, is the most highly valued because most abundant of the migratory fishes. At Samoa it is equally abundant, the name being here _Atule_. _Trachurops torva_ is the meaji, or big-eyed scad, of the Japanese, always abundant.

To _Caranx_, _Carangus_, and a number of related genera, characterized by the bony armature on the narrow caudal peduncle, a host of species may be referred. These fishes, known as cavallas, hard-tails, jacks, etc., are broad-bodied, silvery or metallic black in color, and are found in all warm seas. They usually move from the tropics northward in the fall in search of food and are especially abundant on our Atlantic coast, in Polynesia, and in Japan. About the Oceanic Islands they are resident, these being their chosen spawning-grounds. In Hawaii and Samoa they form a large part of the food-supply, the ulua (_Carangus forsteri_) and the malauli (_Carangus melampygus_) being among the most valuable food-fishes, large in size and excellent in flesh, unsurpassed in fish chowders. Of the American species _Carangus chrysos_, called yellow mackerel, is the most abundant, ranging from Cape Cod southward. This is an elongate species of moderate size. The cavalla, or jiguagua, _Carangus hippos_, known by the black spot on the opercle, with another on the pectoral fin, is a widely distributed species and one of the largest of the tribe. Another important food-fish is the horse-eye-jack, or jurel, _Carangus latus_, which is very similar to the species called ulua in the Pacific. The black jack, or tiñosa, of Cuba, _Carangus funebris_, is said to be often poisonous. This is a very large species, black in color, the sale of which has been long forbidden in the markets of Havana. The young of different species of _Carangus_ are often found taking refuge under the disk of jelly-fishes protected by the stinging feelers. The species of the genus _Carangus_ have well-developed teeth. In the restricted genus of _Caranx_ proper, the jaws are toothless. _Caranx speciosus_, golden with dark cross-bands, is a large food-fish of the Pacific. _Citula armata_ is another widely distributed species, with some of the dorsal rays produced in long filaments.

In _Alectis ciliaris_, the cobbler-fish, or threadfish, the armature of the tail is very slight and each fin has some of its rays drawn out into long threads. In the young these are very much longer than the body, but with age they wear off and grow shorter, while the body becomes more elongate. In _Vomer_, _Selene_, and _Chloroscombrus_ the bony armature of the tail, feeble in _Alectis_, by degrees entirely disappears.

_Vomer setipinnis_, the so-called moonfish, or jorobado, has the body greatly elevated, compressed, and distorted, while the fins, growing shorter with age, become finally very low. _Selene vomer_, the horse-head-fish, or look-down (see Fig. 113, Vol. I), is similarly but even more distorted. The fins, filamentous in the young, grow shorter with age, as in _Vomer_ and _Alectis_. The skeleton in these fishes is essentially like that of _Carangus_, the only difference lying in the compression and distortion of the bones. _Chloroscombrus_ contains the casabes, or bumpers, thin, dry, compressed fish, of little value as food, the bony armature of the tail being wholly lost.

To the genus _Trachinotus_ belong the pampanos, broad-bodied, silvery fishes, toothless when adult, the bodies covered with small scales and with no bony plates.

The true pampano, _Trachinotus carolinus_, is one of the finest of all food-fishes, ranking with the Spanish mackerel and to be cooked in the same way, only by broiling. The flesh is white, firm, and flaky, with a moderate amount of delicate oil. It has no especial interest to the angler and it is not abundant enough to be of great commercial importance, yet few fish bring or deserve to bring higher prices in the markets of the epicures. The species is most common along our Gulf coast, ranging northward along the Carolinas as far as Cape Cod.

Pampano in Spanish means the leaf of the grape, from the broad body of the fish. The spelling "pompano" should therefore be discouraged.

The other pampanos, of which there are several in tropical America and Asia, are little esteemed, the flesh being dry and relatively flavorless. _Trachinotus palometa_, the gaff-topsail pampano, has very high fins and its sides have four black bands like the marks of a grill. The round pampano, _Trachinotus falcatus_, is common southward, as is also the great pampano, _Trachinotus goodei_, which reaches a length of three feet. _Trachinotus ovatus_, a large deep-bodied pampano, is common in Polynesia and the East Indies. No pampanos are found in Europe, but a related genus, _Lichia_, contains species which much resemble them, but in which the body is more elongate and the mouth larger.

Numerous fossils are referred to the _Carangidæ_ with more or less certainty. _Aipichthys pretiosus_ and other species occur in the Cretaceous. These are deep-bodied fishes resembling _Seriola_, having the falcate dorsal twice as long as the anal and the ventral ridge with thickened scales. _Vomeropsis_ (_longispina elongata_, etc.), also from the Eocene, with rounded caudal, the anterior dorsal rays greatly elongate, and the supraoccipital crest highly developed, probably constitutes with it a distinct family, _Vomeropsidæ_. Several species referable to _Carangus_ are found in the Miocene. _Archæus glarisianus_, resembling _Carangus_, but without scales so far as known, is found in the Oligocene of Glarus; _Seriola prisca_ and other species of _Seriola_ occur in the Eocene; _Carangopsis brevis_, etc., allied to _Caranx_, but with the lateral line unarmed, is recorded from the Eocene of France and Italy.

_Ductor leptosomus_ from the Eocene of Monte Bolca resembles _Naucrates_; _Trachinotus tenuiceps_ is recorded from Monte Bolca, and a species of uncertain relationship, called _Pseudovomer minutus_, with sixteen caudal vertebræ is taken from the Miocene of Licata.

=The Papagallos: Nematistiidæ.=—Very close to the _Carangidæ_, and especially to the genus _Seriola_, is the small family of _Nematistiidæ_, containing the papagallo, _Nematistius pectoralis_ of the west coast of Mexico. This large and beautiful fish has the general appearance of an amber-fish, but the dorsal spines are produced in long filaments. The chief character of the family is found in the excessive division of the rays of the pectoral fins.

=The Bluefishes: Cheilodipteridæ.=—Allied to the _Carangidæ_ is the family of bluefishes (_Cheilodipteridæ_, or _Pomatomidæ_). The single species _Cheilodipterus saltatrix_, or _Pomatomus saltatrix_, known as the bluefish, is a large, swift, extremely voracious fish, common throughout most of the warmer parts of the Atlantic, but very irregularly distributed on the various coasts. Its distribution is doubtless related to its food. It is more abundant on our Eastern coast than anywhere else, and its chief food here is the menhaden. The bluefish differs from the _Carangidæ_ mainly in its larger scales, and in a slight serration of the bones of the head. Its flesh is tender and easily torn. As a food-fish, rich, juicy, and delicate, it has few superiors. Its maximum weight is from twelve to twenty pounds, but most of those taken are much smaller. It is one of the most voracious of all fish. Concerning this, Professor Baird observes:

"There is no parallel in point of destructiveness to the bluefish among the marine species on our coast, whatever may be the case among some of the carnivorous fish of the South American waters. The bluefish has been well likened to an animated chopping-machine the business of which is to cut to pieces and otherwise destroy as many fish as possible in a given space of time. All writers are unanimous in regard to the destructiveness of the bluefish. Going in large schools in pursuit of fish not much inferior to themselves in size, they move along like a pack of hungry wolves, destroying everything before them. Their trail is marked by fragments of fish and by the stain of blood in the sea, as, where the fish is too large to be swallowed entire, the hinder portion will be bitten off and the anterior part allowed to float away or sink. It is even maintained with great earnestness that such is the gluttony of the fish, that when the stomach becomes full the contents are disgorged and then again filled. It is certain that it kills many more fish than it requires for its own support.

"The youngest fish, equally with the older, perform this function of destruction, and although they occasionally devour crabs, worms, etc., the bulk of their sustenance throughout the greater part of the year is derived from other fish. Nothing is more common than to find a small bluefish of six or eight inches in length under a school of minnows making continual dashes and captures among them. The stomachs of the bluefish of all sizes, with rare exceptions, are found loaded with the other fish, sometimes to the number of thirty or forty, either entire or in fragments.

"As already referred to, it must also be borne in mind that it is not merely the small fry that are thus devoured, and which it is expected will fall a prey to other animals, but that the food of the bluefish consists very largely of individuals which have already passed a large percentage of the chances against their reaching maturity, many of them, indeed, having arrived at the period of spawning. To make the case more clear, let us realize for a moment the number of bluefish that exist on our coast in the summer season. As far as I can ascertain by the statistics obtained at the fishing-stations on the New England coast, as also from the records of the New York markets, kindly furnished by Middleton & Carman, of the Fulton Market, the capture of bluefish from New Jersey to Monomoy during the season amounts to no less than one million individuals, averaging five or six pounds each. Those, however, who have seen the bluefish in his native waters and realized the immense numbers there existing will be quite willing to admit that probably not one fish in a thousand is ever taken by man. If, therefore, we have an actual capture of one million, we may allow one thousand millions as occurring in the extent of our coasts referred to, even neglecting the smaller ones, which, perhaps, should also be taken into account.

"An allowance of ten fish per day to each bluefish is not excessive, according to the testimony elicited from the fishermen and substantiated by the stomachs of those examined; this gives ten thousand millions of fish destroyed per day. And as the period of the stay of the bluefish on the New England coast is at least one hundred and twenty days, we have in round numbers twelve hundred million millions of fish devoured in the course of a season. Again, if each bluefish, averaging five pounds, devours or destroys even half its own weight of other fish per day (and I am not sure that the estimate of some witnesses of twice this weight is not more nearly correct), we will have, during the same period, a daily loss of twenty-five hundred million pounds, equal to three hundred thousand millions for the season.

"This estimate applies to three or four year old fish of at least three to five pounds in weight. We must, however, allow for those of smaller size, and a hundred-fold or more in number, all engaged simultaneously in the butchery referred to.

"We can scarcely conceive of a number so vast; and however much we may diminish, within reason, the estimate of the number of bluefish and the average of their capture, there still remains an appalling aggregate of destruction. While the smallest bluefish feed upon the diminutive fry, those of which we have taken account capture fish of large size, many of them, if not capable of reproduction, being within at least one or two years of that period.

"It is estimated by very good authority that of the spawn deposited by any fish at a given time not more than 30 per cent. are hatched, and that less than 10 per cent. attain an age when they are able to take care of themselves. As their age increases the chances of reaching maturity become greater and greater. It is among the small residuum of this class that the agency of the bluefish is exercised and whatever reasonable reduction may be made in our estimate, we cannot doubt that they exert a material influence.

"The rate of growth of the bluefish is also an evidence of the immense amount of food they must consume. The young fish which first appear along the shores of Vineyard Sound, about the middle of August, are about five inches in length. By the beginning of September, however, they have reached six or seven inches, and on their reappearance in the second year they measure about twelve or fifteen inches. After this they increase in a still more rapid ratio. A fish which passes eastward from Vineyard Sound in the spring weighing five pounds is represented, according to the general impression, by the ten to fifteen-pound fish of the autumn. If this be the fact, the fish of three or four pounds which pass along the coast of North Carolina in March return to it in October weighing ten to fifteen pounds.

"As already explained, the relationship of these fish to the other inhabitants of the sea is that of an unmitigated butcher; and it is able to contend successfully with any other species not superior to itself in size. It is not known whether an entire school ever unite in an attack upon a particular object of prey, as is said to be the case with the ferocious fishes of the South American rivers; should they do so, no animal, however large, could withstand their onslaught.

"They appear to eat anything that swims of suitable size—fish of all kinds, but perhaps more especially the menhaden, which they seem to follow along the coast, and which they attack with such ferocity as to drive them on the shore, where they are sometimes piled up in windrows to the depth of a foot or more."

=The Sergeant-fishes: Rachycentridæ.=—The _Rachycentridæ_, or sergeant-fishes, are large, strong, swift, voracious shore fishes, with large mouths and small teeth, ranging northward from the warm seas. The dorsal spines are short and stout, separate from the fin, and the body is almost cylindrical, somewhat like that of the pike.

_Rachycentron canadum_, called cobia, crab-eater, snooks, or sergeant-fish, reaches a length of about five feet. The last name is supposed to allude to the black stripe along its side, like the stripe on a sergeant's trousers. It is rather common in summer along our Atlantic coast as far as Cape Cod, especially in Chesapeake Bay. _Rachycentron pondicerrianum_, equally voracious, extends its summer depredations as far as Japan. The more familiar name for these fishes, _Elacate_, is of later date than _Rachycentron_.

Mr. Prime thus speaks of the crab-eater as a game-fish:

"In shape he may be roughly likened to the great northern pike, with a similar head, flattened on the forehead. He is dark green on the back, growing lighter on the sides, but the distinguishing characteristic is a broad, dark collar over the neck, from which two black stripes or straps, parting on the shoulders, extend, one on each side, to the tail. He looks as if harnessed with a pair of traces, and his behavior on a fly-rod is that of a wild horse. The first one that I struck, in the brackish water of Hillsborough River at Tampa, gave me a hitherto unknown sensation. The tremendous rush was not unfamiliar, but when the fierce fellow took the top of the water and went along lashing it with his tail, swift as a bullet, then descended, and with a short, sharp, electric shock left the line to come home free, I was for an instant confounded. It was all over in ten seconds. Nearly every fish that I struck after this behaved in the same way, and after I had got 'the hang of them' I took a great many."

=The Butter-fishes: Stromateidæ.=—The butter-fishes (_Stromateidæ_) form a large group of small fishes with short, compressed bodies, smooth scales, feeble spines, the vertebræ in increased number and especially characterized by the presence of a series of tooth-like processes in the œsophagus behind the pharyngeals. The ventral fins present in the young are often lost in the process of development.

According to Mr. Regan, the pelvic bones are very loosely attached to the shoulder-girdle as in the extinct genera _Platycormus_ and _Homosoma_. This is perhaps a primitive feature, indicating the line of descent of these fishes from berycoid forms.

We unite with the _Stromateidæ_ the groups or families of _Centrolophidæ_ and _Nomeidæ_, knowing no characters by which to separate them.

_Stromateus fiatola_, the fiatola of the Italian fishermen, is an excellent food-fish of the Mediterranean. _Poronotus triacanthus_, the harvest-fish, or dollar-fish, of our Atlantic coast, is a common little silvery fish six to ten inches, as bright and almost as round as a dollar. Its tender oily flesh has an excellent flavor. Very similar to it is the poppy-fish (_Palometa simillima_) of the sandy shores of California, miscalled the "California pampano," valued by the San Francisco epicure, who pays large prices for it supposing it to be pampano, although admitting that the pampano in New Orleans has firmer flesh and better flavor. The harvest-fish, _Peprilus paru_, frequently taken on our Atlantic coast, is known by its very high fins. _Stromateoides argenteus_, a much larger fish than any of these, is a very important species on the coasts of China.

_Psenopsis anomala_ takes the place of our butter-fishes in Japan, and much resembles them in appearance as in flavor.

To the _Stromateidæ_ we also refer the black ruff of Europe, _Centrolophus niger_, an interesting deep-sea fish rarely straying to our coast. Allied to it is the black rudder-fish, _Palinurichthys perciformis_, common on the Massachusetts coast, where it is of some value as a food-fish. A specimen in a live-box once drifted to the coast of Cornwall, where it was taken uninjured, though doubtless hungry. Other species of ruff-and rudder-fish are recorded from various coasts.

Allied to the _Stromateidæ_ are numerous fossil forms. _Omosoma sachelalmæ_ and other species occur in the Cretaceous at Mount Lebanon. _Platycormus germanus_, with ctenoid scales resembling a berycoid, but with the ventral rays I, 5, occurs in the Upper Cretaceous. Closely related to this is _Berycopsis elegans_, with smoother scales, from the English Chalk.

_Gobiomorus gronovii_ (usually called _Nomeus gronovii_), the Portuguese man-of-war-fish, is a neat little fish about three inches long, common in the Gulf of Mexico and the Gulf Stream, where it hides from its enemies among the poisoned tentacles of the Portuguese man-of-war. Under the Portuguese man-of-war and also in or under large jelly-fishes several other species are found, notably _Carangus medusicola_ and _Peprilus paru_. Many small species of _Psenes_, a related genus, also abound in the warm currents from tropical seas.

=The Rag-fishes: Icosteidæ.=—Allied to the butter-fishes are the deep-water _Icosteidæ_, fishes of soft, limp bodies as unresistant as a wet rag, _Icosteus ænigmaticus_ of the California coast being known as ragfish. _Schedophilus medusophagus_ feeds on medusæ and salpa, living on the surface in the deep seas. Mr. Ogilby thus speaks of a specimen taken in Ireland:

"It was the most delicate adult fish I ever handled; within twenty-four hours after its capture the skin of the belly and the intestines fell off when it was lifted, and it felt in the hand quite soft and boneless." A related species (_S. heathi_) has been lately taken by Dr. Charles H. Gilbert at Monterey in California.

The family of _Acrotidæ_ contains a single species of large size. _Acrotus willoughbyi_, allied to _Icosteus_, but without ventral fins and with the vertebræ very numerous. The type, five and one-quarter feet long, was thrown by a storm on the coast of Washington, near the Quinnault agency.

The family of _Zaproridæ_ contains also a single large species, _Zaprora silenus_, without ventrals, but scaly and firm in substance. One specimen 2½ feet long was taken at Nanaimo on Vancouver Island and a smaller one at Victoria.

=The Pomfrets: Bramidæ.=—The _Bramidæ_ are broad-bodied fishes of the open seas, covered with firm adherent scales. The flesh is firm and the skeleton heavy, the hypercoracoid especially much dilated. Of the various species the pomfret, or black bream (_Brama raii_), is the best known and most widely diffused. It reaches a length of two to four feet and is sooty black in color. It is not rare in Europe and has been occasionally taken at Grand Bank off Newfoundland, at the Bermudas, off the coast of Washington, on Santa Catalina Island, and in Japan. It is an excellent food-fish, but is seldom seen unless driven ashore by storms.

_Steinegeria rubescens_ of the Gulf of Mexico is a little-known deep-sea fish allied to _Brama_, but placed by Jordan and Evermann in a distinct family, _Steinegeriidæ_.

Closely related to the _Bramidæ_ is the small family of _Pteraclidæ_, silvery fishes with large firm scales, living near the surface in the ocean currents. In these fishes the ventral fins are placed well forward, fairly to be called jugular, and the rays of the dorsal and anal, all inarticulate or spine-like, are excessively prolonged. The species, none of them well known, are referred to four genera— _Pteraclis_, _Bentenia_, _Centropholis_, and _Velifer_. They are occasionally taken in ocean currents, chiefly about Japan and Madeira.

Fossil forms more or less remotely allied to the _Bramidæ_ are recorded from the Eocene and Miocene. Among these are _Acanthonemus_, and perhaps _Pseudovomer_.

=The Dolphins: Coryphænidæ.=—The dolphins, or dorados (_Coryphænidæ_), are large, swift sea-fishes, with elongate, compressed bodies, elevated heads, sharp like the cut-water of a boat, and with the caudal fin very strong. The long dorsal fin, elevated like a crest on the head, is without spines. The high forehead characteristic of the dolphin is developed only in the adult male. The flesh of the dolphin is valued as food. Its colors, golden-blue with deep-blue spots, fade rapidly at death, though the extent of this change has been much exaggerated. Similar changes of color occur at death in most bright-colored fishes, especially in those with thin scales. The common dolphin, or dorado (_Coryphæna hippurus_), is found in all warm seas swimming near the surface, as usual in predatory fishes, and reaches a length of about six feet. The small dolphin, _Coryphæna equisetis_, rarely exceeds 2½ feet, and is much more rare than the preceding, from which the smaller number of dorsal rays (53 instead of 60) best distinguishes it. Young dolphins of both species are elongate in form, the crest of the head not elevated, the physiognomy thus appearing very different from that of the adult. _Goniognathus coryphænoides_ is an extinct dolphin of the Eocene.

The name dolphin, belonging properly to a group of small whales or porpoises, the genus _Delphinus_, has been unfortunately used in connection with this very different animal, which bears no resemblance to the mammal of the same name.

Other mackerel-like families not closely related to these occur in the warm seas. The _Leiognathidæ_ are small, silvery fishes of the East Indies. _Leiognathus argentatus_ (_Equula_) is very common in the bays of Japan, a small silvery fish of moderate value as food. _Gazza minuta_, similar, with strong teeth, abounds farther south. _Leiognathus fasciatum_ is common in Polynesia. A fossil species called _Parequula albyi_ occurs in the Miocene of Licata.

The _Kurtidæ_ are small, short-bodied fishes of the Indian seas, with some of the ribs immovably fixed between rings formed by the ossified cover of the air-bladder and with the hypocoracoid obsolete. _Kurtus indicus_ is the principal species.

=The Menidæ.=—Near the _Kurtidæ_ we may perhaps place the family of _Menidæ_, of one species, _Mene maculata_, the moonfish of the open seas of the East Indies and Japan. This is a small fish, about a foot long, with the body very closely compressed, the fins low and the belly, through the extension of the pelvic bone, a good deal more prominent than the back. The ventral fins have the usual number of one spine and five soft rays, a character which separates _Mene_ widely from _Lampris_, which in some ways seems allied to it.

Another species of _Menidæ_ is the extinct _Gasteronemus rhombeus_ of the Eocene of Monte Bolca. It has much the same form, with long pubic bones. The very long ventral fins are, however, made of one spine and one or two rays. A second species, _Gasteronemus oblongus_, is recorded from the same rocks.

=The Pempheridæ.=—The _Pempheridæ_, "deep-water catalufas," or "magifi," are rather small deep-bodied fishes, reddish in color, with very short dorsal, containing a few graduated spines, and with a very long anal fin. These inhabit tropical seas at moderate depths. _Pempheris_ bears a superficial resemblance to _Beryx_, but, according to Starks, this resemblance is not borne out by the anatomy. _Pempheris mulleri_ and _P. poeyi_ are found in the West Indies. _Pempheris otaitensis_ and _P. mangula_ range through Polynesia.

Very close to the _Pempheridæ_ is the small family of _Bathyclupeidæ_. These are herring-like fishes, much compressed and with a duct to the air-bladder. There are but one or two dorsal spines. The ventrals are of one spine and five rays as in perch-like fishes, but placed behind the pectoral fins. This feature, due to the shortening of the belly, is regarded by Alcock, the discoverer, as a result of degeneration, and the family was placed by him among the herrings. The persistent air-duct excludes it from the _Percesoces_, the normally formed ventrals from the _Berycoidei_. If we trust the indications of the skeleton, we must place the family with _Pempheris_, near the scombroid fishes.

=Luvaridæ.=—Another singular family is the group of _Louvars_, _Luvaridæ_. _Luvaris imperialis._ The single known species is a large, plump, voracious fish, with the dorsal and anal rays all unbranched, and the scales scurf-life over the smooth skin. It is frequently taken in the Mediterranean, and was found on the island of Santa Catalina, California, by Mr. C. F. Holden.

=The Square-tails: Tetragonuridæ.=—The _Tetragonuridæ_ are long-bodied fishes of a plump or almost squarish form, covered with hard, firm, very adherent scales. _Tetragonurus cuvieri_, the single species, called square-tail, or escolar de natura, is a curious fish, looking as if whittled out of wood, covered with a compact armor of bony scales, and swimming very slowly in deep water. It is known from the open Atlantic and Mediterranean and has been once taken at Wood's Hole in Massachusetts. According to Mr. C. T. Regan the relations of this eccentric fish are with the _Stromateidæ_ and _Bramidæ_, the skeleton being essentially that of _Stromateus_, and Boulenger places both _Tetragonurus_ and _Stromateus_ among the _Percesoces_.

=The Crested Bandfishes: Lophotidæ.=—The family of _Lophotidæ_ consists of a few species of deep-sea fishes, band-shaped, naked, with the dorsal of flexible spines beginning as a high crest on the elevated occiput. The first spine is very strong. The ventrals are thoracic with the normal number, I, 5, of fin-rays. _Lophotes cepedianus_, the crested bandfish, is occasionally taken in the Mediterranean in rather deep water. _Lophotes capellei_ is rarely taken in the deep waters of Japan.

It is thought that the _Lophotidæ_ may be related to the ribbon-fishes, _Tæniosomi_, but on the whole they seem nearer to the highly modified _Scombroidei_, the _Pteraclidæ_ for example.

In a natural arrangement, we should turn from the _Bramidæ_ to the _Antigoniidæ_ and the _Ilarchidæ_, then passing over the series which leads through _Chætodontidæ_ and _Teuthidæ_ to the _Plectognaths_. It is, however, necessary to include here, alongside the mackerels, though not closely related to them, the parallel series of perch-like fishes, which at the end become also hopelessly entangled, through aberrant forms, with other series of which the origin and relations are imperfectly understood. As the relations of forms cannot be expressed in a linear series, many pages must intervene before we can take up the supposed line of development from the Scombroid fishes to those called _Squamipinnes_.