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In August, 1853, a man was carried into the Pettah hospital at Colombo, having a climbing perch, which he thus attempted to hold, firmly imbedded in his throat. The spines of its dorsal fin prevented its descent, whilst those of the gill-covers equally forbade its return. It was eventually extracted by the forceps through an incision in the oesophagus, and the patient recovered. Burying Fishes.
He saw it when already five feet above the ground struggling to ascend still higher; "suspending itself by its gill-covers, and bending its tail to the left, it fixed its anal fin in the cavity of the bark, and sought by expanding its body to urge its way upwards, and its march was only arrested by the hand with which he seized it." Soc. vol. iii. p. 63.
Had my friend been an ichthyologist he would doubtless have noticed that one had eyelids and the others none; that one had little brushes on its lips, another a small but wide-open slit under the jaw, another a yellow spot on its gill-covers, and so on.
It's very simple when you once know how, but you can't do it with your gill-covers clamped down. His tail wiggled more pathetically than ever, and did its level best to pull him out, but without success. He was wedged in so tightly that he couldn't move, and he was fast smothering, like a baby that has rolled over on its face upon the pillow.
The individual most frequently seen in these excursions in Ceylon is a perch called by the Singhalese Kavaya or Kawhy-ya, and by the Tamils Pannei-eri, or Sennal. It is closely allied to the Anabas scandens of Cuvier, the Perca scandens of Daldorf. It grows to about six inches in length, the head round and covered with scales, and the edges of the gill-covers strongly denticulated.
The position of its fins, and the spines on its gill-covers, might assist its journey upwards, but the same apparatus would prove anything but a facility in steadying its journey down. The probability is, as suggested by Buchanan, that the ascent which was witnessed by Daldorf was accidental, and ought not to be regarded as the habit of the animal.
They do not suspend their respiration in the air; but they absorb the oxygen like a reptile furnished with lungs. It is known that carp may be fattened by being fed, out of the water, if their gills are wet from time to time with humid moss, to prevent them from becoming dry. Fish separate their gill-covers wider in oxygen gas than in water.
Among Fishes, the different Genera included under the Family of Perches are distinguished by the arrangement of their teeth, by the serratures of their gill-covers, and of the arch to which the pectoral fins are attached, by the nature and combination of the rays of their fins, by the structure of their scales, etc.
A fish takes the water in through his mouth continually, and it runs over his gills, and out behind through his gill-covers. So the gills suck-up the air out of the water, and send it into the fish's blood, just as they do in the newt-larva. Yes, I know. But the whale breathes with lungs like you and me; and when he goes under water he has to hold his breath, as you and I have.
The Herrings, not seeing the fine wall of net, swim into it. Now the openings in the net the meshes are one inch across, just wide enough for the Herring to poke his head through. Once through, he is caught. His gill-covers prevent him from drawing back again. Thousands of other Herrings are held tight, all around him, and the rest of the shoal scatters for the time being.
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