who visited India at the close of the ninth century, was told there of a fish which, issuing from the waters, ascended the coco-nut palms to drink their sap, and returned to the sea.  “On parle d’un poisson de mer que sortant de l’eau, monte sur la cocotier et boit le suc de la plante; ensuite il retourne a la mer.”  See REINAUD, Relations des Voyages faits par les Arabes et Persans dans le neuvieme siecle, tom. i. p. 21, tom ii. p. 93.]

There is considerable obscurity about the story of this ascent, although corroborated by M. John.  Its motive for climbing is not apparent, since water being close at hand it could not have gone for sake of the moisture contained in the fissures of the palm; nor could it be in search of food, as it lives not on fruit but on aquatic insects.[1] The descent, too, is a question of difficulty.  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.  In Ceylon I heard of no instance of the perch ascending trees[2], but the fact is well established that both it, the pullata (a species of polyacanthus), and others, are capable of long journeys on the level ground.[3]

[Footnote 1:  Kirby says that it is “in pursuit of certain crustaceans that form its food” (Bridgewater Treatise, vol. i. p. 144); but I am not aware of any crustaceans in the island which ascend the palmyra or feed upon its fruit.  Birgus latro, which inhabits Mauritius and is said to climb the coco-nut for this purpose, has not been observed in Ceylon.]

[Footnote 2:  This assertion must be qualified by a fact stated by Mr. E.A.  Layard, who mentions that on visiting one of the fishing stations on a Singhalese river, where the fish are caught in staked enclosures, as described at p. 212, and observing that the chambers were covered with netting, he asked the reason, and was told “that some of the fish climbed up the sticks and got over.”—­Mag.  Nat.  Hist. for May 1828, p. 390-1.]

[Footnote 3:  Strange accidents have more than once occurred in Ceylon arising from the habit of the native anglers; who, having neither baskets nor pockets in which to place what they catch, will seize a fish in their teeth whilst putting fresh bait on their hook.  In August 1853, a man 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.  Other similar cases have proved fatal.]

Burying Fishes.—­But a still more remarkable power possessed by some of the Ceylon fishes, is that of secreting themselves in the earth in the dry season, at the bottom of the exhausted ponds, and there awaiting the renewal of the water at the change of the monsoon.