. A contribution to American thalassography : Three cruises of the United States Coast and geodetic survey steamer "Blake", in the gulf of Mexico, in the Caribbean sea, and along the Atlantic coast of the United States, from 1877 to 1880. Blake (Steamer); Marine animals -- Atlantic Ocean; Marine sediments. CHARACTERISTIC DEEP-SEA TYPES. FISHES. 33 it may be extended in front of the head and used as an organ of exploration, so that we may imagine this fish feeling its way in the dark, and exploring the ooze to discover buried in it the animal upon which it feeds. To the "pelagic
. A contribution to American thalassography : Three cruises of the United States Coast and geodetic survey steamer "Blake", in the gulf of Mexico, in the Caribbean sea, and along the Atlantic coast of the United States, from 1877 to 1880. Blake (Steamer); Marine animals -- Atlantic Ocean; Marine sediments. CHARACTERISTIC DEEP-SEA TYPES. FISHES. 33 it may be extended in front of the head and used as an organ of exploration, so that we may imagine this fish feeling its way in the dark, and exploring the ooze to discover buried in it the animal upon which it feeds. To the "pelagic Isospondyli" belong those groups which, like the Scopelidse, are found from time to time at the surface, liv- ing or dead, and which, there is reason to believe, inhabit the intermediate depths of the ocean, having the power of ascend- ing and descending developed to an extent which is not at present understood. Among the deep-water groups named above occur the most abnormal specializations, such as powerful jaws, lancet-like teeth, prolonged tactile appendages, and enlargement of the tube-bear- ing scales. They have not the cavernous and feeble skeletons peculiar to the deep-sea gadoids, and many other families, which may have found their way gradually into deep water; they are, as a rule, compactly built, muscular, and are the most actively predaceous of the abyssal forms. The pelagic groups do not, as a rule, exhibit special modifica- tions of form, but they are, with few exceptions, provided with peculiar luminous appendages, which, like the cavernous skele- tons and exaggerated mucous systems, have been by many wri- ters attributed to deep-sea fishes in general. In his " Challenger " letters, Willemoes-Suhm speaks of the luminosity of Scopelus. (Fig. 219.) It is well known to the fishermen of the Mediterranean that at the death of the fish the luminosity ceases. We frequently brought in scope- lids in our tow- n e t s, and could observe the phos- phorescence
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