In the Scorpion-fishes we have a small group including several forms remarkable for their ugliness, having added to an uncouth shape skinny appendages, which, projecting from the body, resemble rather leaves of seaweed than parts of the fish. These appendages, by their waving motion, serve either to attract other fishes or to afford concealment by their resemblance to the surrounding weeds. The ground-dwelling forms have some of the rays of the breast-fin modified into finger-like processes, like those of the Gurnards, by which they both crawl and feel. Some members of the family bear a rather close resemblance to the Sea-perches. In addition to their ugliness, some have become especially offensive by the transformation of certain of the fin-spines into poison-organs.
One of the ugliest, and at the same time most dreaded, of the family is the Stone-fish figured on page [619]. Each spine of the back fin is grooved. At the lower end of these grooves lies a pear-shaped bag containing a milky poison, which is conveyed to the point of the spine by ducts lying in the grooves. The native fishermen carefully avoid handling these fish; but persons walking with bare feet in the sea step upon the spines, and, receiving the poison into the wound, are killed.
Photo by W. Saville-Kent, F.Z.S.] [Milford-on-Sea.
AUSTRALIAN GROPER.
Highly esteemed as a food-fish.
All the scorpion-fish are carnivorous, and differ from the majority of fishes in that they produce their young alive. The smallest of the Spiny-finned fishes are members of this group, some scarcely exceeding 1½ inch in length. They are common amid the coral-reefs of the Pacific.
Passing over some comparatively unimportant members of this family, we come to a small group of vegetable-feeders from the Indo-Pacific, of which the Teuthis is one of the best known representatives. They are chiefly remarkable for the fact that the abdominal cavity is surrounded by a complete ring of bones, and that the air-bladder is forked at both ends. Some are rather brilliantly coloured.
The Slime-heads, which constitute the next family, derive their name from the presence on the head of large mucus-bearing cavities covered with a thin skin. The eyes are always of great size, indicating a deep-sea habitat, or at least a depth only dimly lighted. All indeed, save two species, descend considerably below the surface, one species having been found in 345 fathoms. The species of one genus are believed to inhabit still greater depths, for their eyes are extremely small, indicating degeneration through disuse. The copious supply of slime is also an indication of a deep-sea habitat. The members of this family vary much in size and shape, but the most remarkable of all is a small and rare species found off Japan, in which the scales have joined together to form a perfectly solid armour, whilst the paired fins of the abdomen have been reduced to a single spine, with a few vestiges of other rays.
