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Banfield, E. J. (Edmund James), 1852-1923

"Confessions of a Beachcomber"


FOUR THOUSAND LIKE ONE
Among the more remarkable fish that people these waters is a species
that does not come within the limits of my limited reading on the
curious things of Nature. No doubt, it is well known to the initiated,
but I take the opportunity of saying that these notes are not penned
with the presumptuous notion of enlightening the learned and the wise,
but for the edification, mayhap, of those who do not know, who have no
means of acquiring information first hand, to whom text-books are
unavailable, and who are not above sharing the pleasures of one whose
observations are superficial, and to whom hosts of common things in
Nature are rare and entertaining.
In the clear water of Brammo Bay, a greenish black object, a yard across
by about a yard and a half long, moved slowly along, swaying this way
and that, but maintaining a fairly accurate course consistent with the
shore. As the boat drifted, it seemed as if an unsophisticated sting-ray
had lapsed into the blissfulness of ease, careless alike of mankind and of
its enemies in the water. When within reach the boat-hook was used as a
spear more to startle the indolent fish than in the vain hope of
effecting its capture.


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