Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 12.djvu/319

Rh Hommel himself made the following experiment: He had a few of these fishes placed in a large vessel containing sea-water. When they had become accustomed to this prison, lie ran a pin through a fly, and made it fast to one side of the vessel. He then was so fortunate as to see "these fishes vying with one another in their efforts to seize the fly, and continually squirting little drops of water, without ever missing their aim."

We owe it to truth to add that Bleeker, who resided so long in the Dutch Indies, and who is perfectly familiar with the ichthyological fauna of that region, not only finds in the habits of the bandoulière no confirmation of this singular method of catching insects, but he never even heard it mentioned during his sojourn at Batavia. "Certain it is," adds he, "that at Batavia this species inhabits only the waters of the reefs of the little islands in the bay, and never visits the swampy and sandy beach in the vicinity of the capital, or the mouths of the rivers."

A fish belonging to the same family—Squamipinnes—but classed in another group, has likewise received from Schlosser and Pallas the name of Archer.

Four species, inhabiting the waters of Polynesia and the Indian Archipelago, constitute this group of the Archers, or Toxotæ. Instead of being more or less oval in shape, as is the case with the Chœtodons, the body is here elongated, the line of the back being nearly straight, while that of the belly is curved, so that the fish assumes a triangular



shape. The distinguishing feature of these fishes is the backward position of the dorsal fin, which, relegated to the posterior part of the body, is armed with only three or four spines (Fig. 2). The head, lying in the same plane with the line of the back, is pointed; the eye