This wonderful little fish—for it is not more than six or seven inches long—is a native of Java and other parts of the Indian Archipelago. It is of a curious appearance, the body being much compressed—as though it had been flattened out sideways—and its dorsal fin is spiny, like that of the perch, but set much further back, so that it almost touches the tail. The head is pointed, with the lower jaw or lip projecting beyond the upper one, but the most distinctive feature is the eye, which is extremely large and round, so that it imparts a look of strange staring surprise, to which, no doubt, the creature is a stranger. The surprise is not on the part of the fish, but on that of any insect of moderate dimensions which may happen to be resting on a leaf or flower overhanging the water, and not more than four or five feet above it. The archer-fish, observing it there, swims as near as it can underneath it, and then, approaching its mouth to the surface of the stream, whilst it hangs stationary with pulsating fins, squirts, all at once, out of it a little shower of water-drops, which, striking the insect—bee, fly, moth, or grasshopper—knocks it off into the river. As it falls, the successful marksman lowers its head, and poising itself for a moment, after a few backward strokes, darts on the floating spoil, and devours it. The aim is remarkably sure, nor is the feat a slight one, seeing that the drops are projected to some eight or ten times the length of the fish. By this curious sort of archery, or, rather, water-fire—for the drops fly out, as from the muzzle of a little live gun—an easy living is procurable. _Toxotes jaculator_ (that is its Latin name) is not, like other fish, dependent on the chance of an accidental immersion. Swimming quietly along, under banks heavy with tropical foliage, it peers hopefully up into that flowery firmament, from which its manna is to fall. The keen eye, armed with a sight in proportion to its uncommon size, examines each leaf, each petal, each bending stem or pendent, swaying creeper—the fringe of a world unknown beyond it—and carefully estimates the distance at which an insect buzzes or settles. Anything beyond six feet or so is a bright, particular star, which it were hopeless to attempt—but within that distance the fairest things are attainable; up spurts the glistening shower and down with it, like Iris on her rainbow, the radiant being comes. It is a pretty, clean sort of shooting, without noise, wounds, or blood, much superior to our own.