This variegated fish is found in the rivers at Amboyna and Japan; but even there it is scarce: it is also known at Tranquebar. The flesh is white, firm, and well tasted, like our perch, but it does not grow so large. It is of the voracious kind, feeding on the young of other fish; entire fishes of two inches and a half long have been found in the stomach. The skin is like parchment.

THE head is large, with a mouth in proportion; the bones of the lips are broad; the jaws are of equal length, and armed with several rows of little sharp teeth; as is the palate; but the tongue is smooth and moveable: the nostrils are double, the hinder pair near the eyes. Hereabout begin the scales, which are small, tender, and smooth. The pupil of the eye is black; iris blue: the front operculum is made of two small rounded plates, of which the hinder one is strongly serrated: the gills have a wide aperture, and one half of the membrane is concealed: the body is broad; the belly prominent; and the anus in the middle of the body. The colour of the fish is silvery, with transverse stripes and spots of brown. The soft rays of the fins are mostly divided into four branches. This species is produced in the East Indies, and takes its name from the shape of the fins.

On the coasts of Africa and America, and in the waters of the East Indies, are found several varieties of the holocenter, which are remarkable for the brightness of their colours; and are known, by the structure of their mouths, to be carnivorous. They mostly prey on crabs and young fishes, which they swallow whole. Their flesh is much esteemed by the natives, it being pleasant and wholesome food.

THE head is small; the eyes large, with a black pupil, and yellow iris: the nostrils are near the eyes. The aperture of the gills is crescent-shaped, and close to the pectoral fin. The back is of a blueish colour; sides and belly white. The fins are all short, with black spots and branched rays; and the body is covered with light and dark brown spots: the spines are longer on the sides than on the back and belly.

This species is found not only in America, but in the Red-Sea, and near the shores of Japan. At New-York, where it appears only in the summer months, it goes by the name of the goad-fish; and the natives fish for them for amusement. They throw in a line baited with the tail of a sea-crab; the fish approaches, but, being afraid of the line, it makes several turns and trials round the bait, and at length nibbles at it, but pretends to reject it, and passes by, striking it with its tail, as if it did not regard it: but if the rod be kept steady, it presently turns back, seizes the bait, and swallows hook and all. When it finds itself taken, it becomes enraged, bristles up its spines, swells out its belly, and endeavours to wound every thing that is near it. Finding this of no avail, it resorts to cunning, and seems to submit: it lowers its spines, contracts its body, and lies like a wet glove. But this artifice not succeeding, and perceiving the fisherman dragging it towards the land, it renews his defensive attitude with redoubled fury. The spines are now vigorously erected, its form rounded, and its body so completely armed at all points, that it is impossible to take it by the hand; it is therefore dragged to some distance, where it struggles and quickly dies.

THE SPOTTED TOAD FISH.

THE head is small; the lower jaw protrudes beyond the upper, both furnished with very small teeth, like a file; in the middle there is a small cartilage, which serves instead of a tongue; the lips, and indeed many other parts of the body, send out barbles. The body is laterally compressed, and armed with crooked spines: the head and back are broad in front, but go tapering towards the tail; the belly is thick, and swelling out. From the upper lip shoots out an elastic barble, at the end of which are two long fleshy substances which seem as if formed for holding prey; behind this barble is another fleshy ray, and stronger; and between that and the dorsal fin another still thicker; both are fastened to the back by a skin; these instruments help this clumsy slow-swimming animal in catching its prey. The eyes are near the mouth; they are round; they have a black pupil, and the iris is yellow, striped with brown.

This fish is yellow on the sides and back; brown on the belly; and the body and fins are varied with stripes and spots of brown colour, of different shapes; the stripes are broad in some parts, in others only strokes; some have white spots, others brown edged with white. The pectoral and ventral fins give this animal the look of a It has quadruped, but the other fins shew it to be a fish. no lateral line, any more than the rest of the genus. The skin on the belly is thin, and only fastened to the flesh here and there by little bandages.

This fish is found in Brazil and China; it generally keeps at the bottom of the water among sea-weed, or between stones, and grows to the length of nine or ten inches.

THIS fish is remarkable for its big belly, which is swelled out by a large double urinary bladder. The mouth is in the upper part of the head, and very wide; the teeth are numerous, but stand without order: the gill-coverts are fastened to the aperture almost all round: the skin is covered with a thick mucus; all its parts are flabby and loose. The upper surface is mostly of an olive colour. This species is found in the sea which separates Kamtschatka from North America; it seldom exceeds a foot in length.

THE body of this fish is very thin, of a silver colour, inclining to red, and without visible scales. The head is large, very much shelving; the mouth large; the jaws

are furnished with very small teeth, and the upper lip with two large bones: the nostrils are double, and near the eyes, which are round and large; the pupil is black, the iris brown, inclining to a silver grey: the opening of the gills is large; the covert is long, consisting of one plate, under which the membrane is hid: the lateral line is crooked at its origin; the anus is not far from the ventral fins. All the fins are of a bright green colour; in the dorsal fin, the nine first rays are short and hard, the next four long and soft, and both are single; the pectoral, ventral, and tail fins, are branched.

This fish lives in all climates, being found, according to different authors, at Brazil, Jamaica, the Antilles, the East Indies, and Malta. It grows from six to nine inches in length, is well tasted, and lives upon worms, insects, and other little marine animals.

THE head of this fish is broadest at top, the mouth large, and opening obliquely; the under jaw is the longest, and both are armed with sharp teeth, one row in the upper, and two in the lower: the tongue is thin, broad, and rough the eyes are large, standing at the top of the head; the pupil is black; the iris silver, mixed with blue; there is a round hole in the inner edge of each eye: the aperture of the gills is wide; the covert single: before the aperture are five minute holes, and several of the same kind near the eye; they probably secrete a viscous or slimy matter. This fish has an extremely slender and tapering shape; the body being twelve inches in length, and scarcely one in thickness; it is of a silvery colour, and semi-transparent. The pectoral fins are small; and their rays so slender, that they are almost imperceptible. About an inch behind the head, rises the dorsal fin, which is continued