BUTTERFLY-FISH, or CORAL-FISH. These beautiful fish representing the large family Chwtodontidce and its allies of the scaly finned group (Squamipinnes) of marine fishes, obtain their English names from their oval form, brilliancy and their quickness of move ment, and the fact that their principal habitat is in and around the tropical coral-reefs. They are so compressed as to resemble the "pumpkin seed" sunfishes of the ponds, and are aided in keeping their balance by a very high, arched dorsal fin and an anal fin extended beyond the tail. Their colors are always gay, usually rich orange-yellow, as a ground tint, set off by broad, black bars and fin ornaments in great variety, besides blue and red touches. The type-genus Cheetodon is represented by several species in the West Indies, and southward, some of which occasionally drift northward in the path of the Gulf Stream. More numerous in American waters is the "black-angel" (Po macan thus arcuatus), common around Porto Rico and at Key West, where it is caught in traps, or sometimes speared. The "blue-angel"
(Holacanthus ciliaris) represents a genus con taining several West Indian species, of which the most important is the "rock beauty) (H. tri color), often exceeding a foot long, and good food, as well as most beautiful. The name "angel-fish" is also given in Bermuda to several similar fishes of the genus Angelichthys, called in Spanish aisabellitas?' All these fishes are carnivorous, and Jordan remarks that their ex cessive quickness of sense and motion enable them to maintain themselves in the struggle for existence in the close competition of the coral reefs, notwithstanding that they are made so conspicuous to their enemies by their bright colors. Consult Jordan and Evermann, and Game Fishes of America>• (1902).