The Waxahachie daily light. [volume] (Waxahachie, Tex.) 1894-current, 1911-09-16

easily knock down a man or a horse.
After a few consecutive shocks the
battery is exhausted and the eel mas
to retire to a nearby mud bank TO
rest so that he can generate a new
supply. In an hour or two he is
ready for the next victim
This eel is very good to eat but no
one cares to take them off the
hooks so the common way to eaten
them is to drive horses into the bay
Gus where they are known to pc
plentiful. The cells attack the horses
and quickly exhaust their batteries
When they are powerless to do any
further electrocution they are spear
ed by the natives. Not infrequentiy
horses are lost in this manner o.
fishing.
Now the eel is not the only fish to
be safeguarded by powerful eiectrlc
batteries, There is the torpedo ray,
or skate. which looks like three
cornered kite with long tail, equal
" dangerous to handle without rub
Der gloves. There are also several
quite unrelated fishes which possess
the extraordinary property OF com
municating an electric shock to ami
mails with which they come in con-
tact,
In all cases the electrical organs
are notifications of muscular us
sues looking like mass OF closely
packed prisms. each divided into 81
series of compartments filled with Il
gelatinous substance. The whole Is
like a group of voltaic piles.
The electric ray has its batteries
! located near the head and supplied
with energy from large nerves pro-
ceeding from the brain. 1t is an ugly
customer and can give as much trou-
BILE as the electric eel; man getting
shock from a large specimen viii
remember it for long time II II
doesn't kill him outright, Even the
little rays can give quite a shock
when molested in any way. The cleo
trio ray is a member of the skate
family and most skates can produce
more or less electricity, but the ray
is the only one which is dangerous
to handle.
Then there is the electric cat fish
from the Nile which carries around
powerful storage battery concealed
under its skin next to the muscles.
This battery is layer or blanket OF
electric cells covering most of the
body. The current can be discharged
at will and it is quite powerful, but.
as the fish never attains huge pro-
portions, its current is never dan
gerous to anything except small an
imals.
While all those fish mentioned
above are capable of producing cleo
tricity for hunting and defensive
purposes not one of them utilizes the
current for electric lighting. And
yet, strange as it may seem, there
are plenty of fishes who do use cleo
tricity produced by themselves, FOR
this very purpose.
Not until recently has any attempt
been made to investigate the life o.
the travis and drag nets suspende'
| mile under the water, where it /
necessarily total darkness all tn
time reveal multitude of small
fishes each equipped with an elec
trio light Without this light, c
I course, they would be unable to Sc
at all at that great depth where thu
sunlight can never penetrate. tn,
nets bring up a host of these small
fishes and in nearly every case they
are equipped with the brightest eyes
their way along the dark pathways
of the deep.
No man knows just how the cleo
tricity for this light is produced but
it is there nevertheless The deep sea
fish are of many strange shapes and
in most of them, the lamps are sus-
pended at the ends of long feelers
and can be turned on or off at will.
Presumably when the fish wants to
go on a visit or a hunt for food he
out. When he wants to rest he seeks
some secluded corner in the rocks
and turns out the light, sleeping ia
comfort and safety until he is hun
cry again.
There are many other animals, in
sects and bugs which can produce
more or less electricity, but in such
feeble and limited amounts that
they are hardly worth mentioning in
this article. OF course everyone is
familiar with the common lightning
glow of heatless light at will