Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XIII.djvu/552

 536 PIPE FISH ter for smoking. The large bowl of this pipe is set upon an air-tight vessel containing water, and a small tube from the pipe passes down into the water. The smoking tube is inserted into the side of this vessel, and communicates through a long flexible tube with the mouth- piece. By exhausting the air through this the smoke is forced down under the water, and en- tering the space above it passes into the stem, freed by its contact with the water from some of the most acrid properties of the tobacco. The German pipes are of great variety, as well of material as of form. Those of porcelain are sometimes beautifully painted in the style of fine chinaware painting. Iron tobacco pipes are used in Thibet and Mongolia. Pipes are now very extensively carved from the roots of briers (called brierwood pipes) and other roots, and cheaper ones from various kinds of wood. The stem is of cherry, horn, or other material, connected with the bowl by a perforated piece of cork. PIPE FISH, the popular name of the subfam- ily syngnathince of the lophobranchiate order of marine acanthopterygian fishes, and particu- larly of the genus syngnathus (Linn.). The characters of the order have been given in the article LOPHOBRANCHS. In the subfamily the form is much elongated, and covered with a series of imbricated plates, and the gills are arranged in tufts instead of plates. The genus has a seven-sided body, the snout straight and cylindrical, and without spines ; a single dor- sal on the middle of the back, not on an ele- vated plane, the upper border of the back never in the same line with that of the tail ; the up- per border of the latter either continuous with the lateral line or interrupted where that ends ; dorsal surface flat or slightly concave, and the rings of the body 24 to 27 ; the gill opening is circular and high up, and the ventrals are want- ing ; the jaws tubular, the mouth at the end ; in some species the pectorals, anal, and caudal are wanting; the tail is not prehensile ; the head in the same line with the body ; the males have a caudal egg pouch under the tail, open in its whole extent. About 20 species are described, of which in Europe the best known is the great pipe fish (S. acus, Linn.), sometimes called nee- dle fish ; this has all the fins except the ven- trals ; it is found at high or low water, swim- ming slowly among sea weeds, feeding on small crustaceans and mollusks, marine worms, in- sects, and roe of fishes. In the male the poste- rior part of the abdomen is broader than the rest, with two soft flaps folding together and forming a kind of pouch for the reception of the eggs, which, it is believed, are placed there by the female; it is greatly attached to the young, which also, when small, are said to take refuge in the pouch; it is interesting to ob- serve that whenever among fishes unusual care is taken of the eggs or young, this duty is per- formed by the males. It attains an average length of 18 in., and is pale brown, transverse- ly barred with darker brown ; the tail is fan- shaped. In America is the S. PecManus (Sto- rer), which attains a length of 12 in. ; the color is olive brown, with numerous transverse dark- er bars, and yellowish below ; pouch present, and all the fins except the anal, or the latter is exceedingly minute ; eyes prominent and very Pipe Fish (Syngnathus Peckianus). movable. Another species, from New England and New York, less common, is the brown pipe fish (S. fuscus, Storer), of a general brownish color. It is very easy to see in the aquarium that the tail is not the sole nor the principal organ of locomotion in these fishes, and many species have no fin but the dorsal ; when desi- rous of rapid progress, they move the body very much like an eel, but in ordinary locomotion the dorsal is the chief motor organ ; this may be seen to make short and quick vibratory movements which pass in spiral waves along its border, like the screw of a propeller, and might well have suggested this motive power to naval architects. They have also a remark- able power of moving the eyes, even through an arc of 90, and each independently of the other ; this faculty is possessed by the family. Other acanthopterous species of the family aulostomidce are also called pipe fishes ; these are characterized by the prolongation of the bones of the face into a long tube, at the end of which is the mouth ; the ribs are short or ab- sent, and the intestines have neither great dila- tations nor many folds. In Jlstularia (Linn.) the mouth is small, with a nearly horizontal gape ; the body long and slender, the head form- ing one half or one third of the total length ; branchiostegal rays six or seven ; dorsal single and simple, opposite the anal ; teeth small ; one or two jointed filaments, sometimes as long as the body, issuing from between the deep forks of the caudal; air bladder very small; scales invisible. The serrated pipe fish (F. ser- rata, Bloch) attains a length of 28 to 30 in., of which the caudal filament is 10 or 12 in. ; color light drab, with a narrow brownish blue band along the sides, the throat white, and the abdomen and irides silvery; the snout with Serrated Pipe Fish (Fistularia serrata). longitudinal serrated ridges ; the lower jaw the longer and somewhat curved upward, with a fleshy protuberance at the chin ; the shoul- ders covered with horny plates; the dorsal and anal triangular, pectorals quadrangular, ven- trals very, small and about midway between