Daily Ohio statesman. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1855-1870, 1866-12-17
THE FISHES OF BRAZIL.

Many tropical fishes are brilliantly strip
ell, spotted and cOlored. One has broad,
black paids upon golden ground; one has
each scale variegated with yellow, blue and
orange, so that the combined effect when
it darts through the water. is indescribably
brilliant. Some are red, some bright green,
and some have purple or crimson stripes
and Spots. They also often have curious
appendages about the nose, elongated jaws,
or nostrils, or fringes of felers that re-
semble English whiskers. One fish has so
short an upper jaw that the strong teeth
with which the lower jaw is provided have
no corresponding ones to meet them. This
creature has feeers some feet in length,
which it can elevate like fishing rod, and
thus, as it lies hid in the mud, seize prey
and drop it into the waiting mouth below.
One family, the callicbthys, has the power
of secreting so much water as enables it to
leave the river and travel for miles upon
land. Professor Agassiz has often seen
the at this distance, and has even known
of their making their way up the rough
b lIk of trees. A gentleman, our consul at
Surinam, wrote him that, with the same
shot, he had brought down a parrot and
one of these fishes.
They build nest something like that of
the stickle- back, but larger and of cOarser
materials. Here they deposit eggs and sit
upon them. Another family collect in the
trunks of the trees. A hollow log has been
sent him, in which seven of these fishes of
good size, had crowded themselves; they
were 80 closely packed that he was obliged
to split the log in order to remove them,
and he could not understand how they ever
moved about in such mass. of one fami-
ly of fish the fat has the property of dis
coloring the fl ssh of any animal that fe Ids
up)n it, and sometimes producing an erup-
ton. The Indians take advantage of tn
to produce the bright yellow spots which
we often see upon green parrots. They
feed the birds on the fat of this fish, and the
eruption thereby produced changes its
feathers. There arein our cabinet num-
ber of parrots which we had classified as
of different species on account OF these yell
low markings which we now find to be
mere product of the ingenuity of the saw
| ages.
One variety of fish grows to great size I;
| 1t Is often fifteen feet in length, and Is the
beef of the Amazon valley, forming the
principal food of the Indians. Some of
the fish are very formidable, and much
| feared by travellers. They have wide
| mouths, armed with sharp serrated teeth,
and will quickly cut out piece from the
| flesh of any animal. A COW or mule that
should fall into the river, would be de-
voured in the space of an hour by these
| fishes. One family strongly resembles the
electrical eel, with which we are acquaiut-
| ed, only they are more highly charged
with electricity, SO that one of their shocks
| is too powerful for a man willingly to bear.
After three or four strong shocks, the cleo
tricity il, for a time, exhausted, so that
the natives, as Humboldt has told, when
they undertake to capture these eels, drive
mules into the river to receive the first
shocks of electricity, and afterward secure
their prey with comparative ease.