. Cassell's natural history. Animals; Animal behavior. THE FLYING FISH. 123 The genus Scombresox has a close general reseinblaueo in form of body to Belone, the jaws being similarly elongated, and the body similarly slender, and covered with thin deciduous scales. The essential diflerence between the genera consists in the development in Scombresox of a number of detached Unlets posterior to the dorsal and anal fins, which extend to the caudal fin. In this genus, too, the lower jaw is longer than the upper. Several species are known from New Zealand, Japan, Chili, the Mediterranean, and both s
. Cassell's natural history. Animals; Animal behavior. THE FLYING FISH. 123 The genus Scombresox has a close general reseinblaueo in form of body to Belone, the jaws being similarly elongated, and the body similarly slender, and covered with thin deciduous scales. The essential diflerence between the genera consists in the development in Scombresox of a number of detached Unlets posterior to the dorsal and anal fins, which extend to the caudal fin. In this genus, too, the lower jaw is longer than the upper. Several species are known from New Zealand, Japan, Chili, the Mediterranean, and both sides of the Atlantic. The last species referred to—Scombi-esox saurus—commonly known as the Saury, or Skipper, in usually from a foot to eighteen inches long, and the depth of the body may be about an inch. The teeth are small; the upper jaw has a hinge movement, as in Belone. The food of this fish consists chiefiy of the smaller Crustacea, though the stomach occasionally contains sea- weeds. Like the allied Belone, it resembles the Mackerel in flavour, and swims on the surface. It travels in shoals, and has the power, when followed by the Poi-poise, or carnivorous fishes, of springing out of the water to a height of several feet, and passing over a distance of thirty or forty feet before it again touches the Sea. Couch, indeed, mentions that, when pursued, the iish rush along the surftvce, like pebbles making "ducks and drakes," for more than a hundred feet, apparently by the repeated touch on the water of the pectoral, ventral, and other fins and finlets on the lower part of the body. Several thousands have sometimes been taken in a single cast of the seine net. The third genus—Hemirhamphus—includes about forty species, mostly from tropical seas, though they are perhaps more abundant in the East Indian Archipelago, and adjacent waters, than elsewhere, and certain species, like Hemirhamphus fluviatilis, occur only in the rivers of Java and other Eastern count
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