There are one or two strange fishes which you will not see in any shop;
though if you have friends who "follow the sea," they may have told you
of the Sun-fish, sometimes caught in the west of Ireland; very large and
round it is, of a silvery-white colour, so that on dark nights, when the
fishermen have seen it shining as it swam, just under the water, it has
seemed to them like the sun shining behind the clouds on a showery day; and
they have given it this name.
You may too, have heard strange tales of another round fish, called from
its shape the Globe-fish, and from its skin the "Sea-hedgehog"; it is
covered with sharp thorns, and has the power, by swallowing air, of so
greatly increasing its size (without sharing the fate of the poor toad in
AEsop's Fable) that it not only can rise to the surface of the water, but
float as long as it pleases. Then there are the blue Flying-herrings, with
long fins, which you would see if you took a voyage to Australia. These
poor little creatures have enemies both in birds and fishes. When the
sharks want to make a meal of them, they leap into the air, using their
long fins almost as a bird uses its wings, and are able to keep up for some
distance; some say they can fly five hundred feet; but alas! when they are
on the fin, the sea-gulls are eager and ready to pounce upon them, and they
have to take refuge in the sea again. With all their beauty, they have
a hard life of it, constantly escaping away from the sea-gull, into the
shark!
And now, when we have time, I think both you and I shall be pleased not
only to observe carefully the fishes which we see every day, but to
read about others; about the sword-fish, which has neither scales for
its protection, nor teeth, but whose snout forms a bone, four or five
feet long, set with sharp pointed teeth on each side--somewhat like a
double-edged saw; this bone is a most formidable weapon when used against
large fish, and is so strong that it has even pierced through the planks of
a boat; about the tiny Sea-horse, with its head so curiously like that of a
horse, and its wing-like fins; about the Whale, which is not really a fish
at all (and why it is not will be something for you to find out), besides
a great many monsters of the deep of which I have not time to tell you.
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