[f. FLYING ppl. a. + FISH.] A name given to two kinds of fish (Dactylopterus and Exocœtus), which are able to rise into the air by means of enlarged wing-like pectoral fins.

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c. 1511.  1st Eng. Bk. Amer. (Arb.), Introd., p. xxviii/1. There by be many w[h]alefysshes and flyinge fysshes.

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1624.  Capt. Smith, Virginia, V. 182. On the eleuenth day from his losing the sight of land, two flying fishes fals in his boat, whose warme iucie blood hee sucked to his great comfort.

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1821.  Shelley, Prometh. Unb., IV. i. 86.

            As the flying fish leap
    From the Indian deep,
And mix with the sea-birds half-asleep.

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  b.  A constellation of the Southern Hemisphere.

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1868.  Lockyer, Guillemin’s Heavens (ed. 3), 335.

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