But the rainbow colours, like those you see upon a
soap bubble, are almost as soon gone; they will have lost their brilliancy
before the boats come in, and the men begin to throw the fish on shore, and
to count them.
One fish, "the Arrow of the Sea," is never so beautiful as when it is
dying. I have read that the Romans--after they ceased to be a brave people,
and became idle and pleasure-loving--used to have these fish brought in
before dinner and shown to the guests. The gay, thoughtless ladies, as they
clapped their hands with delight at the beauty of the quickly-changing
colours--white turning to sky-blue, and then to deep red--cared no more for
the suffering of the poor fish, gasping and dying before them, than for the
fading petals of a rose; so hard-hearted can people become, who think only
of their own pleasure. If poor Jack had been there, it would have made
him grieved and angry indeed to have seen one of the "God-made" creatures
treated so cruelly, would it not? You remember how he loved all living
things, and could not bear that they should be hurt.
From the Gold-fish, with their brilliant, flashing scales, you can form
some idea of how brightly coloured the fish in tropical seas are; but the
most brilliant fishes have not always the most graceful forms, nor are they
so good for food as those better known to us.
It is very interesting to observe that the sea-creatures which live upon
the surface of the ocean are bluish or quite colourless and transparent, as
some jelly fish, which look as if they were made of glass, and one kind of
fish of which I have heard that its body is so transparent that the words
of a book can be read through it.
Pages:
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263