Suid. v. θυννοσκόπος. t. i. p. 1336, seq. Aristoph. Eq. 313. Aristot. Hist. Animal. iv. 10. They who act as sentinels in the catching of the sword-fish, take their station on a platform in the fishing boat itself. “In the middle (of the bark) is fixed an upright pole, seventeen feet high, with ladders to go up it, and a kind of round platform at the top, for one of the crew, who acts as sentinel, to stand on. This platform is called _fariere_.” Spallanzani, Travels in the Two Sicilies, iv. 336. Footnote 1441: Poll. i. 97. Footnote 1442: Similar methods still prevail in the Mediterranean. “We had,” says Chandler, “frequent opportunities (while at Genoa) of seeing the method of fishing within the mole. Several seines are united and extended so far as to form a large semicircle, but much curved at the two extremities. The men then retire to some distance, and begin clattering with sticks or hammers on the sides of their boats; the noise making the fish rise. One stationed on the yard-arm of a ship, takes notice which way they swim, and gives directions, until they are within the net, when they are driven towards the ends, and are soon entangled; or, trying from despair to leap over, fall on a wing, which is fastened to long reeds, and kept floating horizontally on the surface. The reward of much toil was, now and then a few mullet. The thynnus, or thunny fish, was anciently and is now taken nearly in this manner, but in shoals which endanger and often break the nets.” Travels, &c., i. p. 6, seq. Footnote 1443: Plin. Nat. Hist. xxxvii. 17. Footnote 1444: Cf. Winkelm. ii. 93. ----- This proceeding they account for by supposing that, of its two dull eyes, the right sees best, and that, in obedience to the guidance of this peeper, it makes the circuit of the sea in the manner stated. A better reason may be, that its peculiar food[1445] is most plentiful on the Asiatic coast in spring, and on the European in autumn, if, after all, we are to regard the fact itself as well established.[1446] In this traject, however, it seems in reality, for some cause or another, to shun the vicinity of the City of the Blind, which constituted, perhaps, one of the principal causes of its inferiority to Byzantium. Nevertheless, a very delicate species of pelamys,[1447] caught there, was known in the commerce of the ancient world, and transported to all parts of Greece. ----- Footnote 1445: