. Fishes. Fishes. 4^4 Percomorphi a sword made of consolidated bones. The teeth are very feeble and the ventral fins reduced to two or three rays. The species are few in number, of large size, and very brilUant metalHc coloration, inhabiting the warm seas, moving northward in summer. They are excellent as food, similar to the swordfish in this as in many other respects. The species are not well known, being too large for museum purposes, and no one having critically studied them in the field. Istiophorus has the dorsal fin very high, like a great sail, and undivided; Istiophorus ni- gricans is
. Fishes. Fishes. 4^4 Percomorphi a sword made of consolidated bones. The teeth are very feeble and the ventral fins reduced to two or three rays. The species are few in number, of large size, and very brilUant metalHc coloration, inhabiting the warm seas, moving northward in summer. They are excellent as food, similar to the swordfish in this as in many other respects. The species are not well known, being too large for museum purposes, and no one having critically studied them in the field. Istiophorus has the dorsal fin very high, like a great sail, and undivided; Istiophorus ni- gricans is rather common about the Florida Keys, where it reaches a length of six feet. Its great sail, blue with black spots, is a very striking object. Closely related to this is Istiophorus orientalis of Japan and other less known species of the East Indies. Teirapturus, the spearfish, has the dorsal fin low and divided into two parts. Its species are taken in most warm seas, Teirapturus imperator throughout the Atlantic, Tetrapturus am-- plus in Cuba, Tetrapturus mitsukurii in Japan and in Southern California. These much resemble swordfish in form and habits, and they have been known to strike boats in the same way. Fossil IstiophoridcB are known only from fragments of the snout, in Europe and America, referred provisionally to Istio- phorus. The genus Xiphiorhynchus, fossil swordfishes from the Eocene, known from the skull only, may be referred to this family, as minute teeth are present in the jaws. Xiphiorhyn- chus priscus is found in the London Eocene. The Swordfishes: Xiphiidse. — The family of swordfishes, XipJiiidcE, consists of a single species, Xiphias gladius, of world-. FiG. 380.—Young Swordfish, Xiphias gladius (Linnaeus). (After Lutken.) wide distribution in the warm seas. The snout in the sword- fish is still longer, more perfectly consolidated, and a still more effective weapon of attack. The teeth are wholly wanting, and there are no ventral fins, while the second
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