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The swordfish, when swimming at the surface, usually allows its dorsal fin and the upper lobe of its caudal fin to be visible, projecting out of the water. It is this habit which enables the fisherman to detect the presence of the fish. It swims slowly along, and the fishing-schooner with a light breeze finds no difficulty in overtaking it. When excited its motions are very rapid and nervous.
Carapace smooth, rather flattened, with a keel on each side above in front; the beak longly produced, flattened, three toothed at the top; hands rather compressed, smooth, thinner and slightly toothed on the inner edge; the wrist triangular, angularly produced in front; the central caudal lobes with two slightly diverging keels continued, and like the others thin and flexible at the end, the inner lateral lobes with two keels, each ending with a spine.
Spokes of some regularity fix the diameter of the mouth; a swaying walk and the guiding aid of the caudal appendages have laid lozengy meshes across these spokes. This part has been strengthened by the nightly rounds of inspection. Lastly come the less-visited expanses, which consequently have a thinner carpet.
The dorsal and caudal fins were dark gray, and the others mostly of a brilliant orange or bright yellow. We calculated that the lake was fully twenty miles long, and not less than fifteen broad in its widest part; and had we not been in a hurry to proceed on our journey, we agreed that we would have willingly spent some days in this enchanting spot. However, this was not to be thought of.
Having in possession or in prospect the best part of half a world, with all its climates and soils to choose from; equipped with wings of fire and smoke than fly with him day and night, so that he counts his journey not in miles, but in degrees, and sees the seasons change as the wild fowl sees them in his annual flights; with huge leviathans always ready to take him on their broad backs and push behind them with their pectoral or caudal fins the waters that seam the continent or separate the hemispheres; heir of all old civilizations, founder of that new one which, if all the prophecies of the human heart are not lies, is to be the noblest, as it is the last; isolated in space from the races that are governed by dynasties whose divine right grows out of human wrong, yet knit into the most absolute solidarity with mankind of all times and places by the one great thought he inherits as his national birthright; free to form and express his opinions on almost every subject, and assured that he will soon acquire the last franchise which men withhold from man, that of stating the laws of his spiritual being and the beliefs he accepts without hindrance except from clearer views of truth, he seems to want nothing for a large, wholesome, noble, beneficent life.
I selected a sturgeon, whose body was so powerfully plated that he could not be crushed, and his long-pointed shape gave him great facility for penetrating dense waters. I attached a phosphorescent light to his caudal, that I might not lose him in the gloom, and he preceded me along the sloping interior.
At the contractor's establishment they are thoroughly dissected. First the shoes are pulled off; they are usually worth fifty cents a set. Then the hoofs are cut off; they bring two dollars a set. Then comes the caudal appendage, worth half a dollar. Then the hide I don't know what that sells for.
A cow has four feet, but the subsequent one on the right side is her main reliance. With this foot she can strike a blow that no man or woman born can elude. It resembles a load of drunken chain-shot, and searches every cubic yard of atmosphere in a two-acre lot for a victim before it stops. She is also provided with a caudal appendage that ends in a patent fly-brush.
The greatest dexterity is required in this manoeuvre by all practising it, as the slacking of either lasso enables the bull to turn upon his caudal persecutor, who is certain to be gored to death. This, indeed, not unfrequently happens. But a Llanero cares little for death.
As soon as they came in sight of it Josh. dashed forward, and raising the dead animal by its caudal appendage, angrily exclaimed: "That's my dog! You must be the man who was lurking around my house last night! You had better go down and explain to Mrs. Maroney what you were doing around there." "What do you suppose I could be doing at your house?" asked Barclay, much perplexed.
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