If we fish in waters known to us, we may be pretty sure of what we
shall _not_ get, but even in our most familiar creeks and rivers, who
can say that the fish which is tugging at our line is certainly a
perch, a cat-fish, or an eel? We know that we shall not pull up a shad
or a salmon, but there is always a chance for some of those great
prizes which are to be found, by rare good luck, in every river and
good-sized stream; a rock-fish, or striped-bass perhaps, or a pike, or
enormous chub.
But there are some fish which would not only gratify but astonish
most of us, if we could be so fortunate as to pull them out of the
water. For instance, here are some fish with both their eyes on one
side of their heads.
[Illustration]
These are Turbots, and are accounted most excellent eating. They
resemble, in their conformation but not in their color, our flounders
or flat-fish, which some of you may have caught, and many of you have
eaten. These fish lie on one side, at the very bottom of the water in
which they live, and consequently one eye would be buried in the mud
and would be of no use, if they were formed like common fish.
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