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An. 1682

Of the Sucking-Fish, or Remora.

ridges, with which it will fasten it self to any thing that it meets with in the Sea, just as a Snail doth to a Wall. When any of them happen to come about a Ship they seldom leave her, for they will feed on such filth as is daily thrown overboard, or on meer excrements. When it is fair weather and but little wind, they will play about the Ship; but in bluft- ring weather, or when the Ship sails quick, they commonly fasten themselves to the Ships bottom, from whence neither the Ships motion, though ne- ver so swift, nor the most tempestuous Sea can re- move them. They will likewise fasten themselves to any other bigger Fish; for they never swim fast themselves, if they meet with any thing to carry them. I have found them sticking to a Shark, after it was hal'd in on the deck, though a Shark is so strong and boisterous a Fish, and throws about him so vehemently for half an hour together, it may be, when caught that did not the Sucking-fish stick at no ordinary rate, it must needs be cast off by so much violence. It is usual also to see them sticking to Turtle, to any old Trees, Planks, or the like, that lye driving at Sea. Any knobs or inqualities at a Ships bottom, are a great hinderance to the swiftness of its sailing; and 10 or 12 of these sticking to it must needs retard it, as much, in a manner, as if its bottom were foul. So that I am inclined to think that this Fish is the Remora of which the Antients tell such stories: if it be not, I know no other that is, and I leave the Reader to judge. I have seen of these Sucking- fishes in great plenty in the Bay of Campechy, and in all the Sea between that and the Coast of Caraccos, as about those Islands, particularly, I have lately de- scribed, Rocas, Blanco, Turtugas, &c. They have no scales, and are very good meat.

We met nothing else worth remark, in our Voy- age to Virginia; where we arrived in July 1682. That Country is so well known to our Nation, that I