# Natural History, Fishes/Malacopterygii

ORDER II. MALACOPTERYGII.
(Soft-finned Fishes.)
The skeleton in the members of this Order is, like that in the preceding, formed of bone. Their fins are, however, supported by flexible, jointed, and branched rays. "This," says Mr. Swainson, "is the chief typical character, and the exceptions are very few. In some, as in the Siluridæ, the first rays of the dorsal and pectoral fins are represented by bony spines, the sides of which are crenated, or toothed, like a saw. In the Flat-fishes (Pleuronectidæ) the rays are semi-spinous; and even among the most typical Families, the first two or three dorsal rays are rigid: yet all these deviations take not from the fact, that the whole of these fishes are known by the absence of spiny rays, placed after the first or second, in any of their fins."
In addition to this character it may be observed that, with few exceptions, the gill-openings are unconfined, and the gills have the structure common to the Acanthopterygii, of fringes resembling the teeth of a comb.
The Soft-finned Fishes are, in general, inferior to the Spinous-finned in the degree of development of those essential characteristics which distinguish a fish from other vertebrate animals they are a step lower in the scale of organic ​perfection. The great majority of fresh-water fishes are found here, though associated with many that are exclusively marine. A considerable proportion of the species are ground-feeders; fishes which have the powers of swimming feebly developed, and are compelled to grovel on the mud at the bottom, and lie in wait for passing prey. An example of this kind we saw in the Frog-fishes, among the Spinous-finned Order, but this is an exception to the general habits of that energetic group, and indeed is by some zoologists excluded from its pale.
The Order before us is surpassed by the preceding in elegance of form and brilliancy of colour. Not that it is absolutely deficient of either: the Herrings afford examples of the former, and not a few of the great Salmon Family exhibit both qualities in high perfection; but, generally speaking, they are not prevalent in the Order. In a property, however, of much greater importance, their utility in contributing to the sustenance of man, the Soft-finned tribes vastly surpass all the other Orders of Fishes put together. Among the marine species, the various kinds of Herring, Pilchard, Sprat, and Shad; the Cod, Whiting, Pollack, Hake, Ling, and Barbot; the Plaice, Dab, Flounder, Halibut, Turbot, Brill and Sole;—among the freshwater species, the Carps, Barbel, Tench, Bream, Roach, Dace, and Chub; the Pike; the Eels; the various kinds of Trout and Salmon, the Char, the Gwyniad, and the Pollan, including their varieties and kindred species, may be mentioned as being all of more or less value to man. Many of these, as is well known, are the subjects of important fisheries, the sources of ​employment to myriads of industrious people, and the fountains of commercial wealth to towns, districts, and even nations; of these we shall have to speak somewhat in detail.
In general there is but one dorsal fin present in this Order: some of the Cods indeed are described as having three, but we rather incline to consider these as divisions produced by interruptions of continuity in one lengthened fin; just as the finlets in the typical Mackerels are structurally nothing more than the posterior portions of the second dorsal and anal cut into notches. The Salmons have a minute second dorsal, commonly called the adipose; but it is not a true fin in structure, being only a lamina of fat inclosed in a fold of skin, quite destitute of rays.
The most singular aberrations of form and function that we meet with in this Order are found in the Flying-fishes, and in the Flat-fishes. The former, by an enormous development of some of their fins, are able to take long flights through the air like birds: the latter have a most remarkable contortion of the body, whereby the usual symmetry of form and organs and colour is lost. Both of these peculiarities will require special notice in their proper order. The large Family of the Eels also presents interesting peculiarities.
As in the Acanthopterygian Order, we give from the Prince of Canino's Synopsis a list of the twelve Families included in the Malacopterygii, with the number of species included by him in each Family, at the time (1831) when it was published. As we go through the Families in course, we shall mention the number of species assigned ​to each by the same authority in his recent Conspectus, published in 1850. Thus it will be seen how rapid are the accessions that are now being made to our knowledge of the species of animals.
| | | SP. | | | SP. |
| 1 | Cyprinidæ | 266 | 7 | Pleuronectidæ | 77 |
| 2 | Esocidæ | 72 | 8 | Cyclopteridæ | 27 |
| 3 | Siluridæ | 128 | 9 | Echeneididæ | 4 |
| 4 | Salmonidæ | 148 | 10 | Ophidiadæ | 16 |
| 5 | Clupeadæ | 103 | 11 | Murænadæ | 75 |
| 6 | Gadidæ | 41 | 12 | Syngnathidæ | 43 |
| Total 1000 ||||||||
Family I. Cyprinidæ.
(Carps.)
In this very extensive Family, comprising so many of our well-known and familiar river-fishes, the mouth is small and shallow; the jaws are feeble and destitute of teeth; but the pharynx (or entrance of the gullet) is defended by strong teeth which compensate for the feeble armature of the jaws: the tongue is smooth. The form is somewhat compressed, and symmetrical; the body covered with scales, which are generally large; the fins are destitute of scales; the rays are soft, the membrane somewhat opaque: there is but one dorsal, generally placed near the centre of the back: the gill-rays are few in number. The stomach is continuous, and the intestine is not furnished with any cæcal appendages.
The Carps are considered to be the most herbivorous of all fishes, feeding chiefly on the seeds ​and roots and half-decayed leaves of sub-aquatic vegetation; and even, as is asserted, (though probably on insufficient evidence,) swallowing the ooze and sludge deposited at the bottom of ponds, for the sake of the organic matter contained in it. The typical genera are well furnished for the bruising and grinding down of tough vegetable tissues, possessing in the armed pharynx a powerful instrument of mastication, which we shall presently describe more fully. The majority of species have thick fleshy lips, sometimes furnished with short cirri or tentacles, and a thick, soft appendage to the palate, well known by the erroneous appellation of "Carp's tongue," which being freely supplied with nerves of sensation, is doubtless endowed with a delicate perception.
Mr. Swainson sees an analogy between this Family and that of the Eels, which he instances in the following particulars: the possession of thick, fleshy fins; the mucous slime with which their bodies are clothed; the absence or paucity of proper teeth, and the vegetable nature of the diet. The resemblance, however, appears to us but slight, and counterbalanced by much more numerous and more important points of dissimilarity:—while in one of the particulars enumerated the analogy fails egregiously; for the Eels are as indiscriminately voracious as the Carps are abstemious.
This is the most numerous in species of all the Families of Fishes, containing, according to Prince Bonaparte's late Conspectus, the immense number of seven hundred and twenty-three. This, however, includes the Loaches of the Old and of the New World, of which that ​zoologist makes two distinct Families. We prefer to consider them as Sub-families.
1. Pœciliana. In this group, the head is flat, the jaws are broad, and flattened horizontally, with a very small mouth, furnished with one or more rows of very fine teeth; the gill-openings are large, with, in general, five gill-rays; the body is rather short, and clothed with large, strong scales. This Sub-family comprises about fifty species, which chiefly inhabit the rivers of America. One little species is found in Sardinia, and another (Cyprinodon umbra, Lacep.) is remarkable as being one of the inhabitants of those subterraneous lakes in Austria where perpetual darkness reigns.
Another species, still more interesting, as if to make a superabundant use of the light which the former is destined never to see, has the organ of
vision fourfold. It is the Anableps tetrophthalmus, commonly known as the Four-eyed Loach of the Brazilian rivers. This appellation is, however, only partially correct. “The eyes,” observes Cuvier, “are prominent, placed under a ​sort of roof formed by the side of the frontal bone; and the cornea and iris are divided by transverse bands, which give the fish the appearance of having four eyes, whereas in reality it has only two. There are certainly two openings to each eye, but still, in its essential parts, the organ is single; and whether vision is performed by the anterior or posterior opening, the same sentient organ is acted on." These remarks are confirmed by the observations of a recent naturalist, Mr. Edwards, who, in his delightful work, "A Voyage up the Amazon," thus speaks. "One curious species, the Anableps tetrophthalmus, was very common; it is called by the people, the four-eyed fish, and is always seen swimming with the nose above the surface of the water, and propelling itself by sudden starts. The eye of this fish has two pupils, although but one crystalline and one vitreous humour, and but one retina. It is the popular belief that, as it swims, two of its eyes are adapted to the water, and two to the air."
It adds to the interest of this singular little fish, that it, as well as all the other species of this group, brings forth its young alive, and in a state of considerable advancement.
2. Cobitina. Here the head is small; the body lengthened, clothed with minute scales, and enveloped in a viscous slime. The mouth is very small, placed beneath the snout, without teeth, but having thickened lips, forming a kind of sucker, and furnished with numerous fleshy cirri. The gill-openings are small, and there are but three gill-rays. There is a small dorsal situated ​in the middle of the back; and the ventrals are placed just beneath it; the caudal is large and rounded, or truncate. The air-bladder is two-lobed, and is curiously inclosed in a case of bone, attached to the spine. There are twenty-two species known as Loaches, which are found in the fresh waters of the Old World, and chiefly in the rivers of India. Two, however, are British; and are among the most minute of our fishes, the one attaining the length of three inches, the other that of four. Though so minute, the flesh of the Loach is accounted excellent; and in some parts of Europe, so great is the estimation in which it is held for its exquisite delicacy and flavour, that it is often transported with considerable trouble and expense from its native streams, to such as flow through the estates of the opulent. Frederic I., of Sweden, imported our common species (Cobitis barbatula, Linn.), from Germany into his own dominions, where they were readily naturalized.
3. Cyprinina. In this Sub-family, which comprises an immense majority of the species, the small mouth, the jaws absolutely destitute of teeth, and the three flat gill-rays, are obvious distinctions, to which are added the palatal cushion, and the grinding apparatus in the pharynx. The tongue is smooth; the scales are usually large; the air-bladder is divided into two compartments by a narrow neck. There is but one dorsal, generally near the middle of the back. No fewer than six hundred and fifty species are enumerated in this group, which are principally inhabitants of the fresh waters of the Old World; a few are found in America; but only, ​as far as we know, in the northern division, both of the one and the other hemisphere. Of this great host, one hundred and twenty-five species are marked by Bonaparte as European, and twenty are found, in greater or less abundance, in British waters. Austria and Prussia are the chief Carp countries in Europe, but the streams of temperate and southern Asia constitute the great home of the group.
Among the twenty native species are some of the fishes most familiar to anglers; such as the Carps proper (of which there are three kinds), the Gold-fish of our parlours and reservoirs, the grovelling and wallowing Barbel, the Gudgeon, the slimy Tench, the three kinds of Bream, the crimson-finned Roach, the silvery Dace and Grayling, the "logger-head Chub," the golden Rudd, the Bleak, whose scales are used in making artificial pearls, and the brilliant little Minnow, the desire and delight of truant school-boys.
Genus Cyprinus. (Linn.)
The true Carps, which are numerous, have the lips fleshy and moderately thick, but not plaited nor notched; there are sometimes small cirri or tentacles at the corner of the mouth; the jaws are of equal length. The dorsal is lengthened, with the first and second rays bony; the second ray of this fin, as well as the first of the anal, is cut into strong teeth along its hinder edge.
The fleshy tubercles which are found attached to the lips of some of the Carps, occasionally produced into cirri or beards, and which, in the Barbels, an allied genus, are large and ​conspicuous, are doubtless delicate organs of touch; and, being principally conferred on such species as habitually grovel on the bottom, they may be intended to compensate for the lack of light in such situations, as an aid for the discovery and trial of substances proper for food. The tongue, in most fishes, appears not to be an organ of taste; when it projects at all into the mouth, it is commonly covered with integuments, which are callous and void of sensitive papillæ, or else these are hardened and sharpened into bony teeth, studding its surface, and denying the power of sensation. "The integuments of the palate, however, not unfrequently present that degree of vascularity, and supply of nerves, which indicate some selective sense, analogous to taste. In the Carps, the palate is cushioned with a thick, soft vascular substance, exuding mucus by numerous minute pores, but more remarkable for its irritable, erectile, or contractile property; if you prick any part of this in a live Carp, the part, rises immediately into a cone, which slowly subsides; this peculiar tissue is richly supplied by branches of the glosso-pharyngeal nerves; it may assist in the requisite movements of the vegetable food, as well as add to it an animalizing and solvent mucus, whilst it is undergoing mastication by the pharyngeal teeth."
These teeth themselves are interesting from their position and nature. The lower pharyngeal ​bones are set with stout teeth, forming, as it were, a pair of jaws at the entrance of the gullet; these are opposed by a great flattened disk of stony hardness, placed above them, and lodged in a cavity or socket in the base of the skull. Between these, the vegetable substances on which these fishes principally subsist, are strongly ground down, before they are transmitted to the stomach; and thus compensation is given for the entire absence of teeth in their more ordinary situation at the anterior orifice of the mouth.
The scales in the Carps have their free margins rounded and entire, and their front, by which they are imbedded into the skin, cut into sinuosities, but not toothed. The accompanying engraving represents scales selected from various parts of the Gold-fish, (Cyprinus auratus, Linn.) Figs. a, b, and c, are scales from the lateral line, the first taken just behind the head, the second in the middle, and the third near the tail. The lower part in the figures is the free portion, which alone is visible in the fish, the other part being concealed by the three neighbouring scales that overlap it, above, in front, and below. The tube before referred to, (see page 7), is seen to pervade each, running through a portion of it longitudinally, so that it opens posteriorly on the outer surface, and anteriorly on the inner or under surface of the scale. In the scales near the front of the line, the tube is large and prominent, (as in a,) while, in the very last scale at the opposite extremity, it is merely a groove. d, is a scale from the back; e, one from the middle of the belly, and f, one from the throat. The variety of form in the scales is illustrated by these figures, which ​were all taken from the same individual fish, and their number might have been much increased. The whole surface of each scale, when viewed under a lens of low power, is seen to be covered with concentric lines, following the irregular sinuosities of the outline. These lines are the edges of the successive layers of which the scale is believed to be composed, each layer being added in the process of growth to the under
surface, and each being a little larger every way than its predecessor; thus the scale is a very depressed cone, of which the centre is the apex. There is a marked difference (indicated in the figures) between that part of the surface which is exposed, and that which is covered by the other scales; the concentric marks in the former ​are much coarser and less regular, often being interrupted, and seeming to run into each other, and frequently swelling into oval scars. This may, perhaps, be owing to the surface having been partially worn down by rubbing against the gravel of the bottom, or against other objects in the water. Besides the concentric lines, there are seen on many of the scales, especially those of the lateral line, radiating lines varying in number from one to twenty or more, diverging from the centre towards the circumference, and frequently connected by cross lines forming a sort of network around the centre, (see c). Under the microscope these lines appear to be elevated ridges, dividing the concentric lines; but of their use we are ignorant.
In the microscopical examinations which we instituted while writing these pages, we ascertained some interesting facts. The brilliant golden or silvery reflection that constitutes the beauty of these lovely fishes depends not on the scales themselves, but on a soft layer of pigment spread over their inner surface, and seen through their translucent substance. On carefully detaching a scale, we see on the under side, opposite to that portion only which was exposed, all the concealed parts being colourless, a layer of soft gleaming substance, easily separable, either silvery or golden, according to the hue of the fish. If now we remove a small portion of this substance with a fine needle, and spread it on a plate of thin glass, we shall find, by the aid of the microscope, that it consists of two distinct substances; the one giving the colour, the other the metallic lustre. With a power of 300 ​diameters, the former is seen to be a layer of loose membranous cells of an orange colour, in what are properly called the Gold-fishes, and whitish or pellucid, in the Silver-fishes. If we now add a minute drop of water to the mass, and gently agitate it with the point of a needle, and again submit it to the microscope, we shall have a beautiful and interesting spectacle. The water around the mass is seen to be full of an infinite number of flat spiculæ or crystals, varying much in size, but of very constant form, a flat oblong prism with angular ends, as represented in the accompanying engraving. By transmitted light SPICULÆ OF GOLD-FISH’S SCALE. they are so transparent and filmy as to be only just discernible; but by reflected light, and especially under the sun’s rays, they flash like plates of polished steel. But what appears most singular, is that each spicula is perpetually vibrating and quivering with a motion apparently quite spontaneous, but probably to be referred to slight vibrations of the water in which they float; and each independently of the rest, so as to convey the impression to the observer that each is animated with life, though the scale be taken from a fish some days dead. Owing to this irregular motion, and consequent change of position, each spicula, as it assumes or leaves the reflecting angle, is momentarily brightening or waning, flashing out, or retiring into darkness, producing a magic effect on the admiring observer. To this property, we ​suppose, is to be attributed the beautiful pearly play of light that marks these lovely fishes, as distinguished from the light reflected by an uniformly polished surface. We have found the pearly pigment of the scales to be provided with similar spiculæ in fishes widely differing in size, structure and habits, as the Gudgeon and Minnow, the Pike and the marine Bream. The spiculæ of these fishes agree in general form with those of the Gold-fish, and also in size, with the exception of trifling variations in the comparative length and breadth. The colouring matter is lodged in lengthened cylindrical cells, arranged side by side, and running across the scale, that is, in a direction at right angles to the lateral line.
The Common Carp (Cyprinus carpio, Linn.), though not indigenous to England, is now sufficiently abundant here, especially in the southern and midland counties. In Scotland it cannot be considered other than rare. The period of the introduction of the species into this country is disputed; the probability is, that it was imported into different parts at separate times. The earliest notice of it on record is by Dame Juliana Berners, about the end of the fifteenth century.
The Carp has been known to attain the length of thirty inches, with a girth of twenty-two. Its colours are brownish-olive on the upper parts, and dull white on the lower, the whole surface having a tinge of yellow: the fins are dark brown; the number of their rays is as follows: D. 22; P. 17; V. 9; A. 8; C. 19. The scales are large and coarse; the lateral line nearly straight.
Still waters are principally affected by this species; ponds with soft muddy bottoms are most ​favourable to its increase. It feeds greedily during open weather; but in the depth of winter buries itself in the mud, and lies inactive. It is easily familiarized to the sight of man, and may
be taught to come to the shallows to be fed by hand. It will live a long time out of water, if kept moist and cool.
Carp are occasionally taken in nets in the Thames as large as nine, and even ten pounds each. The angling season opens at the beginning of June, but for the whole of that month the fish have hardly recovered from the exhaustion attendant on spawning, and therefore are scarcely worth the capturing. Towards July, they begin to afford excellent sport; thenceforward the river ​is crowded with punts, and numerous anglers throng the banks, among whom may be seen many of the gentler sex. Gudgeon fishing is then the order of the day, and Chub, Roach, and all the coarser kinds of the Cyprinidæ, are taken in great numbers. Barbel fishing begins later, and continues vigorously prosecuted till October, when the coldness of the weather gradually puts a stop to all fishing until the return of genial spring.
The Carp is wary, and often tries both the angler's skill and patience. The small ones, however, may be caught readily, but the large ones seem to have learned wisdom, "long experience having made them sage." They avoid the baited hook and the net; the latter by sinking into the mud, and allowing it to be dragged over them. They delight in still water where there are aquatic plants with large leaves: they feed on worms, the larvæ of insects, the spawn of other fishes, and the shoots and tender leaves of water plants. It is recommended to sow grass-seed around the edges of ponds where Carp are kept.
"There is," says Mr. Jesse, himself a devotee of the gentle art, "a freshness, a repose, an indescribable enjoyment of solitude on the banks of a clear and placid river, which a lover of Nature can alone sufficiently appreciate. The air is so pure on a fine morning in the spring, her breath so sweet as it passes through the snowy hawthorn bushes, the sloping hills are so varied with trees and flowers, and the meadows so fresh and gay, that cold must that heart be, and insensible to the charms of river-scenery, that does not enjoy such a spot, and look around him with delight. Those ​who have wandered on the banks of my favourite Avon, as it flows through the borders of the New Forest, and seen its clear and sparkling waters passing over the long and yielding rushes, which sometimes show themselves above the surface, and then gently hide themselves as some dragon-fly settles upon them,—those that have watched the graceful bendings of the stream, sometimes opening into shallow broads covered with ephemeræ, and then narrowing into deeper and more rapid channels, will have experienced the quiet enjoyment of the scenery of one of our most beautiful rivers.… It is to the honest and patient angler, that such scenes afford the greatest enjoyment and admiration. Far removed from the noise and turmoil of the world, he prepares his rod, and while standing on the banks of the stream, with the speckled trout rising freely around him, he 'tastes the unrifled freshness of the air,' and is thankful for the innocent enjoyment he is partaking of."
Family II. Esocidæ.
(Pikes.)
Fishes differing much from each other in outward appearance are associated in this Family; and, therefore, the characters by which they can be described are few. The single dorsal, placed far behind, and corresponding, both in form and position, to the anal, is the most obvious character, though not wholly without exception, for in Microstoma, the dorsal is rather before the anal. ​Generally the body is more or less lengthened, somewhat flattened on the summit of the head, and along the back: the mouth is commonly large, and frequently armed with formidable teeth. The intestine is short, and destitute of cæca; the swimming bladder is present.
About a hundred and twenty species constitute this Family; few of which are European. They are scattered, however, over the waters of both hemispheres; some are inhabitants of lakes and rivers, many are oceanic, and most are marine. They fall into two subordinate groups, Pikes and Flying-fishes.
1. Belonina. In this group, containing the Pikes, Gar-fishes, &c., the pectorals are of small size; the body is more or less lengthened; the muzzle much developed, either in breadth or length; the mouth widely cleft, and armed with numerous teeth. Great voracity is characteristic of these fishes. Beside the Pike, presently to be noticed, the most interesting forms in this division are the Gar-fishes (of which the British seas present three examples), remarkable for their lengthened eel-shaped bodies, and the excessive prolongation of one or both of their jaws into slender horny spears. Another singular genus is Stomias, whose widely cleft mouth is set with sharp and curved teeth, so enormously long, that when the mouth is shut, they project above and below, like immense tusks. In other respects also this is a curious form.
2. Exocœtina. Here the body is herring-shaped, but broader on the back: the pectorals are greatly enlarged, as are frequently the other fins also: the mouth is small, obliquely cleft; the teeth few ​and minute; the eyes very large and prominent. By means of the enormous development of the pectorals, these fishes are enabled to project themselves from the water, and to perform a lengthened flight through the air. They are very common
in the tropical seas; vast shoals springing into the air almost constantly in fine weather. A straggler now and then wanders to our own shores. About forty species are enumerated.
Genus Esox. (Linn.)
The freshwater Pikes have a moderately lengthened body with a large, oblong, rounded, flattened ​head; a mouth deeply cleft, and armed on nearly the whole of its interior with minute teeth, besides a row of strong, long, pointed ones on each lower jaw. The body is clothed with small, distinct scales. But two or three species are known, inhabiting the fresh waters of Europe and North America. Of these the most celebrated is our own Pike or Jack, (Esox lucius, Linn.)
The body of the Pike is much lengthened, somewhat four-sided, with the single dorsal placed very far behind. The head is flat, and produced into a broad, rounded muzzle, bearing no small resemblance to a duck's beak, when viewed from above. The gills open far back, behind the pectorals; the eyes are placed near the top of the head. The general form of the head bears an analogy with that of the Crocodile's, nor do the strong and sharp teeth of the lower jaw diminish the resemblance. The colour of the upper parts is dusky olive, marked with close set rows of small silver spots, produced by the disks of the scales. The sides are mottled with yellow and grey, and the belly is white. The fins are dusky, the dorsal, anal, and caudal, clouded and spotted with dark brown and red. The lateral line is scarcely distinguishable; but is nearly straight. The eyes are pale golden.
The scales are rather small for the size of the fish; they are more or less rounded in outline, without any points behind, or any structure there differing from the other parts, the concentric lines, which are very fine and close, being continuous all round. The front edge has some radiating undulations, the usual number of which is three, though sometimes two, and sometimes four, ​are seen on particular scales: the edges of these undulations actually overlap each other, a curious peculiarity of structure. The scales of the lateral line are not furnished with tubes as usual, but are simply cut with a deep narrow incision, through which an outlet is afforded to the mucus, with
which the body of this fish is so profusely lubricated. The above engraving represents scales from different parts of the body: a, is from the back, and has but two undulations; b, is from the lateral line, and has three; c, is from the belly, and has four.
The portrait of the Pike is drawn in the following lively, but not very flattering colours, by ‘Ephemera,’–“He is a greedy, unsociable, tyrannizing savage, and is hated like a Bluebeard. Everybody girds at him with spear, gaff, hook, net, snare, and even with powder and shot. He has not a friend in the world. The horrible gorge-hook is specially invented for the torment of his maw. Notwithstanding, he fights his way vigorously, grows into immense strength, despite his ​many enemies, and lives longer than his greatest foe, man. His voracity is unbounded; and like the most accomplished corporate officers, he is nearly omnivorous, his palate giving the preference, however, to fish, flesh, and fowl. Dyspepsia never interferes with his digestion; and he
possesses a quality that would have been valuable at La Trappe,–he can fast without inconvenience for a se’nnight. He can gorge himself then to beyond the gills, without the slightest derangement of the stomach. He is shark and ostrich combined.… His intemperate habits render him an object of disgust and dread. He devours his own children; but, strange to say, likes better, (for eating,) the children of his ​neighbours. Heat spoils his appetite; cold sharpens it."
A few examples of the indiscriminate voracity that characterizes this monster of the rivers, we select from the multitude that are on record.
A writer in the New Sporting Magazine asserts that on a summer evening he has more than once seen a brood of young wild ducks devoured by a Pike in the course of a few minutes. An unfortunate guinea-pig, that had died in giving birth to a litter of young ones, was thrown with its brood into a piece of water in which were many very large Pike, when the whole were seized and swallowed by one of these tyrants; an incident which gave the keeper occasion humorously to boast that he had seen a Pike which devoured at a meal a sow with a litter of pigs. At times this fish will ravenously seize almost anything that is offered it. In a small stream near London, a Pike lay basking near a cottage, when a gentleman walking round his garden saw it; he procured his rod and line, and for want of other bait desired the cook to cut him off a large slice of veal. With this he baited his hook, and dropping it gently on one side of the fish, the voracious creature instantly seized it, and was captured. It was found to weigh 12lbs.
The voracity of the Pike is shown by a circumstance of no infrequent occurrence in Sweden. Large Perch often swallow the baited hooks of stationary night-lines, and then enormous Pike gorge the hooked Perch in their turn. In this case, though the Pike himself is seldom or never actually hooked, yet on the fisherman's drawing in his line, the Perch sets so fast in the greedy ​throat of the finny tyrant that he has been unable to get rid of it, and both are taken. In some cases, however, the Pike, at the moment of reaching the surface, by means of a desperate lunge, relieves himself from his dangerous victim, and effects his escape.
O'Gorman gives some examples of the same ravenous appetite. One which he killed with a Roach for a bait, had in his maw a Trout of four pounds weight, evidently just taken; and another seized a Trout of more than six pounds. But these examples yield to what he says he witnessed on Dromore. A large Pike having been hooked and nearly exhausted, was suddenly seized in the water and carried to the bottom. Every effort was made for nearly half an hour to bring this enormous fish to shore, but to no purpose; at length, however, by making a noise with the oars and pulling at the line, the anglers succeeded. On getting up the Pike which they had been playing, it was all torn as if by a large dog, but really, doubtless, by another fish of the same species; and as the Pike so illtreated weighed seventeen pounds, the rapacious fish that had held it so long must have been indeed a monster!
Mr. Lloyd informs us that it is not an uncommon thing in the North of Europe for even the voracious Pike to become the prey of a feathered enemy. Eagles frequently pounce on these fish when basking near the surface; but when the Pike has been very large, he has been known to carry the Eagle under the water; in which case the bird being unable to disengage his talons has been drowned. This traveller was informed by ​Dr. Mellerborg, that he had himself seen an enormous Pike, with an Eagle fastened to his back, lying dead on a piece of ground which had been overflowed, but from which the water had then retreated. Captain Eurenius informed the same author that he was once an eye-witness of a similar circumstance. In this instance, when the Eagle first seized the Pike, he succeeded in lifting him for a short distance into the air; the weight of the fish, however, combined with its struggles, soon carried both down again into the water, under which they disappeared. Presently the Eagle was seen at the surface, uttering piercing cries, and apparently making great efforts to extricate its talons; all however were in vain, for after a long continued struggling he finally disappeared in the depths of the river.
In the Swedish rivers the gums of the Pike are said to be periodically subject to a disorder by which they become of so spongy a texture, and so much swollen, that the teeth which are then partially concealed from view, seem scarcely able to perform their function. This change is said always to take place about the time of new moon. The Wermeland fishermen assert that while his gums are in this diseased state, the Pike is almost incapable of devouring his prey, and therefore, at the time mentioned, they hardly take the trouble of laying out their lines; and these simple people assign as the reason for this periodical impotency, that if his teeth were always in good order the Pike would soon eat up all other fishes.
The size, strength, agility, and ferocity of the ​Pike, combined with the goodness of his flesh, make his capture a favourite object of ambition with anglers. He is chiefly taken with trolling and spinning-tackle, which we have already briefly described. A contrivance called the ligger, peculiar to the great meres, or marshy lakes of Norfolk, is said to afford great diversion, and is thus described by Mr. Yarrell:—"The ligger or trimmer is a long cylindrical float, made of wood or cork, or rushes tied together at each end: to the middle of this float a string is fixed, in length from eight to fifteen feet; this string is wound round the float except two or three feet, when the trimmer is to be put into the water, and slightly fixed by a notch in the wood or cork, or by putting it between the ends of the rushes. The bait is fixed on the hook, and the hook fastened to the end of the pendent string, and the whole then dropped into the water. By this arrangement the bait floats at any required depth, which should have some reference to the temperature of the season; Pike swimming near the surface in fine warm weather, and deeper when it is colder, but generally keeping near their peculiar haunts. When the bait is seized by a Pike, the jerk looses the fastening, and the whole string unwinds; the wood, cork, or rushes, floating at the top, indicating what has occurred. Floats of wood or cork are generally painted, in order to render them more distinctly visible on the water to the fishers who pursue their amusement and the liggers in boats. Floats of rushes are preferred to others, as least calculated to excite suspicion in the fish."
​Small fishes, as trout, roach, salmon-fry, a young herring, or the hind part of an eel, are excellent bait for Pike; and for large ones a young one of their own species. But a bright-coloured small bird, a goldfinch or yellow-hammer, will frequently kill, when they will not look at trout or roach. The best time for catching them is the morning; if hazy, with little wind, so much the better.
Family III. Siluridæ.
(Sheat-fishes).
An extensive assemblage of uncouth and repulsive fishes is found composing this Family. They are entirely destitute of scales, instead of which some genera have an armature of large angular bony plates, others have only a naked skin, invested with a thick coat of slimy mucus. In general the head is very broad and flat, with a great cat-like face; the lips send forth beards (cirri) or fleshy tentacles, sometimes of great length. The mouth is small, sometimes furnished with close-set velvet-like teeth, but often quite toothless. In the great majority of the species the first ray of the dorsal, and of the pectorals, takes the form of a stout and strong articulated spine, the edges of which are often cut into sharp teeth pointing backward; these spines are formidable weapons of offence.
Four hundred species are reckoned as belonging to this Family, all of which are inhabitants of fresh waters. They abound in the great ​slow-flowing rivers of both hemispheres, but chiefly in the hotter regions of the globe; a single species only is European, which is not a native of this country.
From what little is recorded of the manners of these fishes, they appear to lie habitually concealed in the mud of the bottom, with their long cirri floating free. The smaller fishes, attracted by these organs, approach to examine them, and are sucked in by the Sheat-fish, and for the most part swallowed whole. Many of the species are eaten with avidity notwithstanding their hideous aspect, the flesh being white, firm, and of good flavour.
They may be considered as forming two Sub-families, the Silurina, with the skin naked and slimy; and the Loricariana, in which the head and body are mailed with large bony plates. The latter are chiefly South American fishes.
Genus Silurus. (Linn.)
The head in this genus is large, round, flat and naked, the mouth furnished with three pairs of long cirri; the body is lengthened; there is one small dorsal fin, unarmed with any spine; the pectorals and ventrals are small, but the anal is very long; the caudal is rounded.
The Sheat-fish or Sly Silure (Silurus glanis, Linn.), the only member of the Family which inhabits Europe, is perhaps the largest of fresh-water fishes. In the large rivers of Austria and Southern Russia, where it attains its greatest development, it is said to be sometimes taken twelve and even fifteen feet in length, with a mouth ​sufficiently capacious to gorge a child of six years old. It is found in the rivers of Africa and Asia, as well as those of Europe. The body is thick and long, but the abdomen is short; the tail, (by which is meant, not the caudal fin, but the part of the body behind the vent,) long and muscular; the head broad and depressed. The upper parts are of a deep green hue, becoming paler on the sides, and merging into yellow on the belly; the
whole obscurely mottled. The fins are partly blue, and partly yellow.
The flesh of this species is greatly in demand on account of its good qualities; it is sent to the markets of Paris from the rivers of Germany. It is described as white, fat, and agreeable to the taste, but luscious, soft, and difficult of digestion to weak stomachs. The flesh is so greasy that it is said to be used as a substitute for lard.
Family IV. Salmonidæ.
(Salmons.)
If the number of component members in any Family were the sole criterion of its importance, the present group would occupy a much less space in our pages than the preceding, containing, as it does, barely one-third of the number of its species. Yet when we think of the various Salmons and Trouts of Europe and America, and add to them the excellent and beautiful Char, the Smelt, small but delicious, the Grayling, Vendace, Gwyniad, Powan, and Pollan, the Capelin of Newfoundland, and multitudes of other foreign species unknown by English names, but valuable as the food of man, we shall be ready to acknowledge that the Salmonidæ constitute a very important and useful Family in the great Class of Fishes.
The typical Salmons are distinguished for the graceful, swelling symmetry of their form; thick and plump in the centre, and tapering to each extremity. Their body is covered with large and well-formed scales; all the rays of their fins are soft; behind the dorsal there is a small spurious fin, consisting of a doubling of the skin filled with fatty substance, but destitute of rays; this is usually known as the adipose (or fat) fin. In general the mouth is well furnished with teeth; their intestine has many cæcal appendages; and they all have an air-bladder.
The well-known fishes of this Family are powerful, bold, and voracious; in general, however, they do not prey upon other fishes, but ​upon crustacea and water-insects. Most are inhabitants of fresh-waters, either permanently or periodically; a very few are marine. One hundred and thirty-two species are included in the Family by the Prince of Canino, which are widely scattered over the Old and New World.
Genus Salmo. (Linn.)
The true Salmons (including the Trouts) are the most completely toothed of all fishes, having a row of pointed teeth in the maxillaries, the intermaxillaries, the palatals and mandibularies, and two rows on the vomer, the tongue, and the pharynx,—so that there is scarcely a part of the interior of the mouth which is not bristling with this armature. The general form is spindle-shaped; the body is clothed with scales, of which the head is deprived; the mouth is cleft to the eyes or beyond them; the ventrals are placed under the dorsal, and the anal under the adipose: the belly is smooth; the air-bladder extends the whole length of the abdomen, and communicates with the gullet. The tip of the lower jaw is bent upwards in old males, and received into a notch above. Many species are marked with spots, and, in early youth, all are clouded with transverse dusky patches.
We have at least seven species of this genus in Great Britain, the common Salmon, five which bear the name of Trouts, and the Char. Of these the Salmon, the Salmon Trout, and the Bull Trout, are migratory, periodically ascending rivers to deposit their spawn, and then returning to the sea, exhausted with the effort. The others ​are permanent residents in fresh waters. The flesh of all is unrivalled among fishes for excellence and flavour, and is in the best condition just before spawning; after that operation has been performed, it is poor, watery, and insipid. The migratory species display indomitable energy and perseverance in overcoming the various barriers that oppose their ascent, leaping over rocks and up cascades of astonishing height. It has been ascertained that individual fishes return year after year to their native stream, almost invariably.
The noblest species is our well-known Salmon,
(Salmo salar, Linn.), of which magnificent specimens crowd every fishmonger’s table throughout the summer season. It attains a great size and ​weight. Salmon of thirty and even forty pounds are by no means uncommon; one has been killed by the angler's rod which weighed sixty-nine pounds and three quarters, and Mr. Yarrell has recorded the occurrence of one in the London market of the astonishing weight of eighty-three pounds. The head of the Salmon is small, the mouth not deeply cleft; the body is thick and muscular, but with graceful swelling outlines, tapering evenly away to the tail; the caudal fin is slightly hollowed. The colours are blackish-grey on the upper parts, lead-grey on the sides, and silvery on the belly: a few dark spots are scattered over the back; and the fins assume the same colours as the regions whence they originate.
The marketable demand for this excellent fish has made it the subject of important fisheries; and as it can be taken with advantage only in rivers connected with territorial rights, and only at the particular season already mentioned, these fisheries are the subject of careful legislative prescriptions. To describe the various modes employed in the capture of the Salmon in British rivers alone would far exceed our space; we can do little more than allude to them. Nets of many kinds, and traps of ingenious device, are sometimes stretched across the stream, to arrest the fish in its ascending course; sometimes, as in the Forth, bag-nets are dropped from projecting platforms or stages; or, as in the Solway, the fishes are received into funnel-shaped nets carried at the end of a long pole. In the Severn, the Welsh fishermen, seated in their funny little boats called coracles, drag a net between two, with which they take ​this fine fish. Many other kinds of nets and seines are also used, some more general, others more local. In some rocky rivers Salmon are taken with the fish-spear, a mode of fishing that requires a quick eye, and a true hand. And numbers fall before the skill and science of the enthusiastic fly-fisher, who counts all other delights joyless to the excitement of his favourite sport.
In Mr. Jesse's very interesting "Scenes of Country Life," there is a letter from a nobleman, who had been on a fishing excursion into the highlands of Scotland, on the subject of fly-fishing for Salmon in the sea. From this communication we make the following extracts. The particular locality is not indicated.
"As far as I am aware there is only one spot in the neighbourhood where fish have been so taken. About four miles to the south of this place, a small river discharges itself into a creek or estuary, which formerly extended about six miles inland, but half of it has been reclaimed by carrying a mound from shore to shore. Within about a mile of the mouth of this creek, the main channel of the tide and the river approaches the south shore, and from the point which commands this channel, the fly is used with murderous effect at half ebb tide. Having a yacht and boats at my disposal, I anchored the latter two days since in the channel, and I never saw men so astonished as some of my Harwich sailors were with the spectacle which presented itself, as they had never seen a Salmon except on a fishmonger's stall. The air, rather than the water, was alive with Salmon and Sea-trout of all sizes, jumping ​as high as if they had to scale a cataract, close to the boat. One which had jumped too far, was caught on the rocks by two of my boys whom I had left on the beach… For about an hour, I should say that the spot in question was the finest angling quarter I ever saw."
The author of "Wild Sports of the West" has described in his lively manner Salmon-fishing in Ireland. Fly-fishing commences in March, but many are not caught in this way until the succeeding month. In June, net-fishing begins. The weir is raised to stop the passage of the fish, the water being allowed to find vent only through a small aperture provided with a trap.
The fishing is carried on only in the estuary where the river meets the sea. The draughting is confined to the last quarter of the ebb, and the first of the flood; five or six boats with as many men in each are necessary. When the Salmon are seen, the nearest boat starts off, leaving a man on shore, with a rope attached to one extremity of the net, which is rapidly thrown over, as the boat makes an extensive circle round the place where the fish are believed to lie. This curve is gradually diminished; stones flung in on each side prevent the fish from escaping; at length the extremity of the net reaches the bank, the semicircle is complete, and the inclosed fish secured. They ​are carefully landed; and five hundred Salmon have been taken at a single haul.
If the season be favourable from the 1st of July to the 12th of August, the daily average may be five hundred Salmon, besides an immense quantity of white Trout. But should the weather be rainy or tempestuous, the Salmon forsake the estuary and remain at sea till it clears; so that the time limited by law sometimes elapses before a moiety of the fish can be secured.
Through the winter months the Salmon rises freely at the fly; but the diminution of vigour and energy in the fish affords very inferior sport. Their beauty and their value too are gone. "They are now reddish, dull, dark-spotted, perch-coloured fish, and seem a different species from the sparkling, silvery creatures we saw them when they first left the sea. As an esculent they are utterly worthless,—soft, flabby, and flavourless if brought to table:—instead of the delicate pink hue they exhibited when in condition, they present a sickly, unhealthy, white appearance, that betrays how complete the change is that they have recently undergone.
"And yet at this period they suffer most from night-fishers. This species of poaching is as difficult to detect, as it is ruinous in its consequences. It is believed that the destruction of a few breeding fish may cost the proprietor a thousand."
Night-fishing is prosecuted when the river is low and the night moonless. The poacher, armed with a gaff and carrying a torch, selects the gravelly shallows, where he may see the fish depositing its spawn; he readily discovers them with the torch, and secures them with the gaff. Hundreds ​of Salmon are thus destroyed, especially in the secluded mountain streams; detection is difficult, and conviction easily evaded. The depredations of poachers are largely connected with the demoralization of private distilling. The men are up all night attending to the still. The watch maintained against the revenue officers enables them to ascertain also when the rivers are unguarded. The firebrand is snatched from the still-fire, the easily-hidden gaff or spear drawn from its corner, and in a few minutes the poacher has exchanged one species of lawless industry for another equally illicit.
Mr. Lloyd describes a simple but effective mode of taking Salmon at Deje, in Sweden, where this fish is very abundant. By rocks or artificial embankments, a portion of the river is divided into several small channels. On each of these two sluices are constructed, one at each end, capable of being opened or closed at pleasure. The fish having once entered these traps, are prevented from returning, and the water being allowed to run off, they are taken out, even by hand, without the least difficulty. Five hundred, and even eight hundred Salmon are thus taken in a single day; though at the same locality, notwithstanding their abundance, they invariably refuse a bait.
Many years ago, great quantities of Salmon were taken in the Thames; but that species of sport has been annihilated, in all probability by the influx of poisonous ingredients which flow in from gas-works and other numerous modern innovations, introduced during the last fifteen years.
Among the enemies of the Salmon is the Eagle, ​probably the fishing Eagle or Osprey. A curious anecdote recorded by the author of "Wild Sports of the West," would intimate that victory does not always fall to the same side. "Some years since a herdsman, on a very sultry day in July, while looking for a missing sheep, observed an Eagle posted on a bank that overhung a pool. Presently the bird stooped and seized a Salmon, and a violent struggle ensued; when the herd reached the spot, he found the Eagle pulled under water by the strength of the fish, and the calmness of the day, joined to drenched plumage, rendered him unable to extricate himself. With a stone the peasant broke the Eagle's pinion, and actually secured the spoiler and his victim, for he found the Salmon dying in his grasp." A grey-haired peasant familiar with flood and field told the same writer that he had remarked the Eagles while engaged in fishing. They were wont to choose a small ford upon a rivulet, and, posted on either side, would wait patiently for the Salmon to pass over the shallows. Their watch was never fruitless;—many a Salmon he had seen, in its transit from the sea to the lake above the ford, suddenly transferred from its native element to the Eagle's wild aërie in the lofty cliff that beetles over the romantic waters of Glencullen.
We shall close our notice of this interesting Family with a species scarcely less valued by anglers than the Salmon, the speckled Trout, (Salmo fario, Linn.), one of the most crafty, voracious, and swift of our fluviatile fishes.
According to Alexandre Dumas, Trout are ​caught in the streams of the Alps in a very original manner. The implements are a heavy knife or bill, and a lantern of curious construction. It consists of a hollow globe of horn, to which is affixed a steel tube three feet long, and an inch and a half in diameter. The junction of the tube and the globe being hermetically sealed,
the oiled wick within the latter, after having been lighted, receives air only from the top of the tube. The mountaineer, thus furnished, wades into the torrents that brawl through the valleys, by night, until the water reaches his middle. With his left hand he plunges the globe of the lantern towards the bottom to nearly the full length of ​the tube. A dim circle of light is thus shed upon the bed of the stream, when the Trout, attracted by the light, crowd around the globe as moths around a candle. The fisherman then slowly raises the lamp, which the fish follow, towards the surface. He can now select the finest fish at his leisure, which he strikes with a well-directed blow on the head with his heavy knife. The fish instantly sinks to the bottom, but it is only for a moment, for it presently rises to the surface bloody and dead, and, floating there, is presently deposited in a bag hung round the operator's neck. The other fishes, alarmed for the moment, are soon attracted again, and become successively the prey of the fisherman, until his desires are satisfied.
Family V. Clupeadæ.
(Herrings.)
In most of their characteristics the Herrings agree with the Salmons; and so close is the affinity between the two Families that the members of the Salmonidan genus Coregonus, the Pollans and Powans of our lakes, are called by the peasantry, both in this country and Ireland, the Freshwater Herrings. The same graceful form, curved in gently swelling outlines, and tapering to a point at each extremity, characterizes this Family, as the preceding; and like it the present is clothed in large, well-formed scales, very easily detached. Their chief distinction is the absence of the adipose fin in the Herrings, which have only a single dorsal of the ordinary structure, placed ​near the middle of the back. The body is more compressed than in the Salmons, and in most of the genera the belly is very thin, forming a sharp edge, frequently cut into saw-like notches, by the projecting scales, the points of which are directed backwards.
The mouth is small and oblique, either furnished with minute teeth, or altogether destitute of these organs; the lips are very thin. The opening of the gills is more than usually wide; hence, by a law already alluded to, the Herrings can survive a removal from the water for only a very brief period. The common Herring and Pilchard are said to die in a few minutes after being caught. The stomach is a lengthened sac; the intestines are furnished with many cæca; and there is generally a long and pointed air-bladder.
The skeleton of fishes generally consists of a VERTEBRA OF HERRING. greater number of bones than that of other animals. The ribs are long and slender spines, but there are many other bones besides the ribs, supernumerary, or rather accessory, spines, which spring from the bases of the ribs, and other parts of the vertebræ. In the Herring family these spinous appendages are peculiarly developed; for they are long, and attached not only to the rib-bases, but to each of the spinous processes of the vertebræ, so that each of these joints carries three pairs of accessory spines, besides a series of slender diverging bones that run along the line of the abdomen.
​The Family consists of one hundred and eighty known species, scattered over all parts of both oceans. Almost all of them are marine, and few of these ascend rivers. Generally they are of small size, comparatively few exceeding our own well-known Herring; yet to this rule the Shad of our rivers is an exception, which grows to three feet in length, and the genus Megalops of the tropical seas is found to attain twelve feet.
The food of such species as we are familiar with consists principally of minute crustaceous animals, and, it is probable, from the minuteness of the teeth in the Family, that the food is in general small.
Genus Clupea. (Linn.)
Some of our best-known and most valuable fishes are contained in this genus, as the Pilchard, Herring, Sprat, and Whitebait, not to reckon the Shads and the Anchovy, which are now placed in separate genera. Its distinctive characters are that the mouth is small, obliquely vertical; the teeth very minute or absent, the jaws nearly equal, not notched; the belly line compressed to an edge, sharp, and generally serrated: the dorsal fin situated above the ventrals; the latter about equal to the pectorals, and both small; the caudal forked: the body is covered with large thin scales, removed with little force.
The Herrings are believed to be wholly carnivorous; and, as we have already observed, minute Crustacea form a large portion of their sustenance. Mr. Yarrell observes of the Pilchard, "I have found their stomachs crammed each with ​thousands of a minute species of shrimp, not larger than a flea.… The abundance of this food must be enormous, if, as there can be no doubt was the case, all the schulls on the coast were as well fed as the individuals I examined." The Herring on the coast of Norway feeds upon a minute species of shrimp, the Astacus harengum of Fabricius. The number of these minute creatures swimming in the sea during summer, is so incalculable, that a vessel dipped into the water will be found to have inclosed thousands. So great is the eagerness of the Herrings for these shrimps, that they follow them wherever they may chance to be driven by tides or currents; and by constantly feeding on them, the bellies of the fishes acquire a ruddy tinge, occasioned, according to Strœm, by a reddish humour contained in these minute marine insects, but more probably, as we think, explained by the effect of the gastric juice of the fish, which turns all crustacea red, just as boiling does.
Besides these, other creatures contribute to furnish food to the Herring tribe. Small medusæ, shelled mollusca, flies, the spawn and the young fry of other fishes, are all found to be agreeable to them. Mr. Yarrell was informed that the fishermen in the Bay of Biscay throw large quantities of the salted roe of fish about their nets, to attract Pilchards, and much of this substance is found in the stomachs of such as are caught. The Pilchard has been known to take a hook baited with a worm, and Herrings to bite at the artificial fly of an angler. They do not scruple to indulge even a cannibal appetite; for, according to Dr. Neill, five young Herrings have been found ​in the stomach of a large old one; a sufficient proof of piscine voracity.
We shall illustrate the genus by this, its most valuable species, the common Herring (Clupea harengus, Linn.), so largely used, both in its fresh and salted condition, as the food of the poorer
classes of society. In form it is much compressed, its depth greatly exceeding its thickness. The lower jaw projects considerably beyond the upper; there are a few small teeth on both jaws and the tongue; the eye is large; the line of the belly is sharp, but not notched. The colours when fresh are a fine greenish blue on the upper parts, and on the sides and belly silvery white.
The immense hosts in which this fish assembles ​at the season when it approaches the shallows to spawn, have given it its common name, Herring being derived from the German heer, an army. The end of October is the ordinary period of the commencement of the spawning season, but it seems subject to local variation. For two or three months before this, the fish is in the highest condition, and is the object of eager pursuit all around the coast. The principal places where the Herring fishery is carried on may be thus enumerated:—Yarmouth, Lowestoffe, Hastings, Folkestone, Cardigan Bay, and Swansea, in England and Wales; the coasts of Caithness, Sutherland, Aberdeen, Banff, Moray, and Ross, in Scotland; and Galway, the coast of Donegal, Mayo, the mouth of the Shannon, Bantry Bay, and the coast of Wicklow, in Ireland.
The number of barrels of Herrings cured in the British fisheries may be considered to average four hundred thousand per annum; this is, of course, exclusive of the vast quantities that are eaten in a fresh state. The fisheries of Northern Europe are also very extensive; in those of Sweden and Norway, it is said that near four hundred millions fish are taken yearly, and twenty millions have been the produce of a single port.
Yarmouth, whose smoked Herrings are well-known by the term "bloaters," derives no small portion of its prosperity from this fishery. A hundred sail of vessels, averaging forty tons each, hail from this place, and about seventy hail from the neighbouring town of Lowestoft. This fieet is augmented by fifty or sixty vessels that arrive from the Yorkshire coast during the season. The capital engaged at Yarmouth is estimated at ​250,000l. The fresh Herrings that are consumed in the metropolis are chiefly from the shores of Kent and Sussex.
The Herring appears on our shores in the middle of summer, but seems to approach the coast of Scotland earlier; for in Sutherland the fishery commences in June, and in Cromarty even so early as May, while the Yarmouth season rarely begins till September. They are taken chiefly by means of drift-nets, described in our account of the Mackerel, and by far the majority are cured; in the first part of the season, however, they are ​often so rich as to be unfit for salting, and these are sold for consumption while fresh. About the month of November, as has been already observed, the shoals spawn, and are then unfit for eating, and the fishery ceases. As is universally known, there are two modes of curing this fish, producing what are called white and red herrings. The former requiring only to be placed in barrels with salt, the process can be performed in the fishing-craft; consequently the vessels for this fishery are larger, being qualified to keep the sea.
The process as performed by the Dutch, who excel all other nations in this art, is described as follows. As soon as the fish is removed from the water, the throat is cut, and the offal is detached; it is then washed with sea-water, and laid in brine sufficiently saturated with salt to float the fish; about eighteen hours afterwards, the batch is taken out of the pickle, and placed, layer on layer, in barrels, with copious layers of salt; and here they remain as long as the boat continues at sea. On her arrival in port, the fish is re-barrelled with care, fresh salt being given them, and new brine poured over the whole.
Red herrings, however, require a much more elaborate process, which cannot be performed on board, and the procuring of them is essentially a shore fishery. The Yarmouth men confine themselves to this branch. They sprinkle the fish with salt, and lay them in a heap on a stone or brick floor, where they remain about six days; they are then washed, and spitted one by one on long wooden rods, which pass through the gills: great care is required that they may not touch each other as they hang; the rods are then suspended ​on ledges, tier above tier, from the top of the house to within eight feet of the ground; a fire is then kindled, and fed with green wood, chiefly oak or beech, and maintained, with occasional intermissions, for about three weeks, or, if the fish are intended for exportation, a month; the fire is then extinguished, and the house allowed to cool, and in a few days the herrings are barrelled. "Bloaters" are prepared with much less salt, and therefore, though their flavour is milder and finer, they cannot be preserved good. Hence the supply of these is almost limited to the few weeks during which the fishery lasts.
Family VI. Gadidæ.
(Cods.)
We have here another Family of fishes eminent in their usefulness to man. Perhaps, indeed, if we consider the great number of edible species, the immense quantities in which some at least are procured, the excellence of their flesh both fresh and salt, and the facility with which they can be preserved for future consumption,—we may safely pronounce these the most valuable of all the finny tribes. There are about a hundred and ten species recognised, and of these fully one-third are European. Twenty-one species are enumerated as British, and of these the following eighteen contribute more or less extensively to supply the need of man:—the Cod, the Dorse, the Haddock, the Pout, the Poor, the Whiting, Couch's Whiting, the Coalfish, the Pollack, the Green Cod, the Hake, the Ling, the Burbot, three kinds of Rockling, the Torsk, and the Forked Beard:—a goodly list!
​The Cods have the body but little compressed, generally rounded, sometimes nearly of equal thickness, at others thickest towards the head, and tapering towards the tail, rather long in proportion to the thickness. The head is naked, but the body is covered with small scales, which, however, are in general nearly concealed by a thick mucous skin, which also invests the fins, and gives them a peculiarly fleshy texture. The eyes are large; the mouth wide, furnished on the jaws and front of the vomer with small unequal teeth, set in rows like those of a card; the gill-openings are large, and there are seven gill rays.
The fins present some peculiarities; their thickened substance, sometimes almost concealing the rays, has been already alluded to; the ventrals are very small, pointed, and often produced into a fleshy filament; three of the five rays of which each of these fins is usually composed, are sometimes wanting, leaving only two thread-like rays destitute of membrane. On the other hand, the dorsal and anal are greatly developed in length; some, as the Cod and Haddock, appear to have three dorsals and two anals, but we incline to think these reducible to one lengthened fin of each kind, variously cleft or interrupted, according to the species. The pectorals and the caudal are of moderate size.
The muzzle and lips are often furnished with fleshy beards (cirri), varying in length, yet never long, and in number from one to five. The stomach is capacious and strong, as is also the air-bladder; the intestine is long, with many cæcal appendages.
The flesh of these fishes is generally white, firm, ​and of good flavour, easily separated into flakes, wholesome, and easy of digestion. They inhabit for the most part the cold and temperate seas, a very few only being found in fresh waters. The northern Atlantic is the great home of the Family, few reaching to the tropical regions, and scarcely any wandering into the Pacific or Indian Oceans.
Genus Gadus. (Linn.)
The Cods proper, (including the Haddock, but not the Whiting,) are distinguished by the following marks. The long dorsal is divided into three distinct portions, of which the first is triangular; the anal is divided into two; the ventrals are small, slender and pointed, placed beneath the pectorals; the caudal is straight-edged, or slightly hollowed. The chin is furnished with a small beard (cirrus) at the point. Five species of the genus as thus restricted are taken on our own shores, and none in greater plenty than the most valuable of them all, (perhaps of all fishes,) the Common Cod, (Gadus morrhua, Linn.) It attains three or four feet in length, and a depth of eight or nine inches; Mr. Yarrell mentions one which weighed 60lbs.; and Pennant speaks of another, caught at Scarborough, of 78lbs. The colour of the upper parts is a dull olive-brown, obscurely marked with yellow, fading to pure white beneath; the lateral line is white. There are two very distinct varieties, one of which has a sharp taper muzzle, the other a thick, rounded one; the former is darker in hue, and affects the southern coast.
​The fishery for Cod on the banks and shores of Newfoundland and Labrador is the most important in the world, for the number of men and the amount of capital that it employs. It is estimated that twenty thousand British subjects are directly engaged in the fishery, and probably thrice as many are more or less directly supported by it. The annual produce of their efforts may be roundly stated at 600,000 hundred weights of dried fish, and 3000 tuns of cod-liver oil; the whole worth, at the place of shipment, 450,000l. sterling. It has been supposed that more than six thousand vessels are engaged in the Cod fishery on both sides of the Atlantic; and that thirty-six millions of these fishes are captured, salted and dried, to be then distributed over the various regions of the globe. "We have eaten them," says Mr. Swainson, "under the name of Stock-fish, in all parts of the Mediterranean, brought by our English vessels; and they are to be had in all parts of the Brazilian Empire,—being carried on the backs of mules from the sea-coast into those provinces of the interior, where fresh fish cannot easily be procured." We believe, however, that the term Stock-fish distinctively applies to the Cod dried whole, or gutted only, without salt, as the Norwegians treat their fish; the British split it, take out the backbone, salt it, and dry it flat. To Brazil and the West Indian Isles, Cod fish is sent in casks, pressed in by a screw; to the Mediterranean and home market it is shipped in bulk.
The Cod is a deep-water fish, rarely coming into the shallows; he is a voracious and almost promiscuous feeder. Unlike the Herring or Mackerel, it can scarcely be called gregarious; ​great multitudes, it is true, congregate together, but they seem not to obey any common laws of motion, shifting their places in great shoals, but rather each obeying the impulse of his own independent will, attracted by the abundance of food, or other causes. From these circumstances, the
depth of its level, and its isolation,–the Cod is not much taken with nets, but principally with the hook and line.
There are two modes of capturing the Cod with the hook; the one is with what are called in Cornwall bulters, which are long lines, to which are attached, at regular distances, other lines six feet in length, each bearing a hook; the intervals are twice the length of the small lines, to prevent ​their intertwining; these are shot across the course of the tide. The other mode is by handlines, of which each fisherman holds two, one in each hand, and each line bears two hooks at its extremity, which are kept apart by a stout wire going from one to the other. A heavy leaden weight is attached near the hooks, and thus the fisherman feels when his bait is off the ground. He continually jerks them up and down, and is thus aware of a fish the moment it is secured. Although this seems a somewhat tedious process of fishing compared with the immense draughts of the net, it is found in skilful hands to be productive: eight men on the Dogger-bank have taken eighty score of Cod in a day.
As in the Cod the peculiar texture and arrangement of the muscles, laid in broad thin parallel flakes, are more obvious than in most other fishes, we will take occasion here to quote a few observations of Professor Owen's on the nature of muscle in this Class of Vertebrata. "The muscular tissue (myonine) of fishes is usually colourless, often opaline, or yellowish; white when boiled: the muscles of the pectoral fins of the Sturgeon and Shark are, however, deeper coloured than the others; and most of the muscles of the Tunny are red, like those of the warm-blooded Classes. The want of colour relates to the comparatively small proportion of red blood circulated through the muscular system; and to the smaller proportion of red particles in the blood of fishes: the exceptions cited seem to depend on increased circulation, with great energy of action; and, in the Bonito and Tunny, with a greater quantity of blood, and a higher ​temperature than in other fishes. The deep orange colour of the flesh of the Salmon and Char depends on a peculiar oil diffused through the cellular sheaths of the fibres. The muscular fasciculi [bundles] of fishes are usually short and simple; and very rarely converge to be inserted by tendinous chords. The proportion of myonine [or muscular tissue] is greater in fishes than in other Vertebrata; the irritability of its fibres is considerable, and is long retained. Fishermen take advantage of this property, and induce rigid muscular contraction, long after the usual signs of life have disappeared, by transverse cuts and immersion of the muscles in cold water: this operation, by which the firmness and specific gravity of the muscular tissue are increased, is called ‘crimping.’”
The Cod is observed to thrive in the confinement of ponds, which are either naturally or artificially hollowed in some parts of our rocky shores, and into which the sea has access at high tide. Other marine fishes, such as Haddock and Whiting, different sorts of Flat-fish and Skate, are also kept in these vivaria, and found to do well. They are fed with Sprats, the young and unsaleable of other fishes, shelled mollusca, and any animal offal, all of which is greedily devoured. On the Hebrides, and the adjacent coast of Scotland, there are several marine stews.
The following description of such a saltwater fish-pond, communicated to the New Sporting Magazine, will be read with interest, as everything that illustrates the habits and instincts of marine fishes is valuable. The pond is situated near the Mull of Galloway, on the west coast of ​Scotland. It was “originally a small basin in the rock, with which the sea communicated by means of a natural tunnel; but as the bottom was very little below the medium level of the sea, it was nearly dry at low water. It having occurred to Colonel M‘Dowall that by increasing the size and depth of this basin he might, at all times and seasons of the year, have a constant supply of sea-fish, he quarried and blasted the rocks both at the sides and bottom, till he had formed a circular excavation of about fifty feet in diameter; and there is now, I believe, at low tide about eight feet of water left; so that the fish have an ample allowance of their native element at all times, and a fresh supply every flood-tide, which rises in the pond about six feet. There is a high wall built on the upper edge of the rock surrounding the pond, to prevent poaching in this unusual preserve; and a grating is fixed before the tunnel to prevent the escape of the fish, and below high-water mark the sea-weed clings to the rocks, giving them in that respect a perfectly natural appearance. A cottage, in which the female keeper and her son reside, adjoins the pond.…
“The door opens to a small landing-place at the top of a flight of steps which leads to the water's edge, where there is a platform of rock, which, at that time, was only about two inches above the level of the water; and below the ledge on which I was standing was another, about a foot under water—less or more. No sooner did the party make their appearance at the top of the stairs than there was a general commotion among the fish, and they rushed towards the platform, pushing and jostling each other in their ​eagerness to get to the place where they are usually fed, just as barn-door fowls do at the sight of the person who feeds them. We came provided with a quantity of mussels, scalded, for the purpose of getting them more easily from the shell, a kind of food on which the Cod and other fish in the pond thrive amazingly; and I was informed that after having been thus stall-fed,—if I may so term it,—for a few weeks, they greatly exceed in flavour and juiciness their untamed brethren of the open sea. I held a mussel between my fingers, about two inches below the surface of the water, and immediately a Cod of about ten pounds weight took it, winning the prize by a head from three or four more of similar dimensions, all of which rushed towards my hand at the same time. It required all the nerve I could muster to prevent me from jerking back my hand at the moment the Cod, with widely extended jaws, took the bait. I made several attempts to get hold of one of them, but they all slipped from my grasp, except one small Cod of about four or five pounds weight, which I succeeded in making a prisoner. Having raised him out of the water and examined him at my leisure, I returned him to his native element, at which he seemed as much pleased as I should have been in regaining terra-firma after an involuntary immersion. There was one large Cod of about ten pounds weight that I made several attempts to get hold of without success, as from his great size and strength he always escaped, and as he could not throw dust in my eyes, he revenged himself by darting off with a whisk of his tail that sent the water flying over me. After taking a short run, he always returned ​to the ledge of rock on which I stood, nothing daunted by my repeated attempts to seize him. The keeper took one of the largest, about the same weight, in her lap, and stroked and patted it, saying, 'Poor fellow! poor fellow!' just as if it had been a child, and she opened its mouth, and put in a mussel, which he swallowed with apparent gusto—at least so I interpreted a wriggle of his tail at that moment—and she then put him back again. I observed several gradations of tameness in the fish; some were quite tame, and came close up to the ledge on which I was kneeling; another class kept parading from right to left about two or three yards from me, but they readily partook of some food that was thrown to them: a third kept aloof altogether, and would have nothing at all to do with me; and others, which I did not see, kept themselves secluded from sight in the nooks and corners at the bottom of the pond, and were, I suppose, the 'Johnny Newcomes,' or 'Griffins,' of the place.
"It is a curious fact that fish when they remain long in this pond always become blind; and I was informed that this is owing to there not being sufficient shelter for them from the heat and glare of the sun, owing to the shallowness of the water compared to the depth of their usual haunts. Several which I saw in this state are fed entirely by hand, as they are unable to compete in obtaining food with those whose sight is unimpaired. Surely some remedy might be found for this. One large and blind fellow called 'Jack' is a great pet, and upon the keeper calling his name, he appeared to hear and understand her, for he came forward slowly, and she held a mussel to his ​mouth, which he swallowed. The fish appear occasionally to disagree among themselves, as I saw one Cod with one eye apparently bitten out, and hanging over its cheek.
"At the time of my visit there were only three kinds of fish in the pond, viz., Cod, Flounder, and a small fish of about three pounds weight (the name of which has escaped my memory); but they frequently preserve Salmon in the same way, besides other kinds. The manner in which they keep up the stock is this. The son of the female who has the charge of the 'preserve' goes out to sea in a boat with a tub or well; and when he catches any fish that he thinks will do, he preserves them in the well, from which he transfers them to the pond, where, in due time, from a month to six weeks, they become tame. A curious scene occurred on one occasion when he put a Mackerel into the pond: there was a general chase after the unfortunate fish, which only saved itself from being devoured by the larger and more ferocious denizens of the place, by running itself on a ledge of rock."
The following remarkable anecdote, communicated to Mr. Jesse by a respectable gentleman in Scotland, would appear to prove that even fishes are not destitute of that measure of reasoning power which enables them to combine cause with effect. "I was ordered to take the cutter I commanded to Port Nessock, near Port Patrick. On landing, I was informed of Colonel M'Dowall's sea fish-pond, and went to look at it. On arriving, I fed the large Cod out of my hand from some mussels which I had in a basin. I purposely, ​however, retained one mussel in the basin, and offered it to the Cod, in order to see how, with its broad mouth and short tongue, it would reach it. The Cod blew into the basin (a small slop-basin), and the re-action forced the mussel out of it, and the Cod seized it immediately. This fish allowed me to pat it on the back, and rested its head upon the stone on which I was standing, just like a dog. The other fish came to me and fed on the mussels I threw to them, but would not let me handle them, though I patted some of them."
The analogous case of the Elephant that blew the sixpence out of the angle of the shelf on which it was placed, when it was too close to the wall to admit the finger of his trunk, will doubtless occur to many of our readers. We are, however, much more surprised to hear of such an effort of reasoning power in a Cod-fish than in an Elephant.
Family VII. Pleuronectidæ.
(Flat-fishes.)
The Turbot, the Sole, and the Flounder, are so familiar to every one, as the commonest fishes at our tables, that probably few think of the extraordinary anomaly presented by their structure, or remember that they are perfectly unique among vertebrate animals. We see that one side is dark and positively coloured, the other is white or slightly tinged with a fleshy hue, and we are apt to suppose that they offer no greater ​peculiarity than that of being greatly depressed or flattened horizontally, like the Skates, which at first sight they much resemble: but, in fact, the coloured surface is not the back, nor the white surface the belly, in the Flat-fish, but these are truly the two sides, right and left, so that instead of being depressed, it is compressed, or flattened vertically, like the Chætodons. The latter, however, like other fishes, swim with the back uppermost, notwithstanding their thinness; but the Turbot or Sole, swims or grovels along the bottom, upon its side, the coloured side, right or left, being uppermost. The term Pleuronectes, compounded of two Greek words, signifying side-swimmer, expresses this peculiarity.
But this is not all. If the eyes had been placed like those of the Chætodon, for example, one on each side, that which belonged to the white or inferior side, would be rendered useless, since it would be almost perpetually buried in the mud of the bottom. Hence, by an unprecedented exception to the symmetry which marks the organs of sense in all other vertebrate animals, both of the eyes are placed on the same side of the head, one above the other. They are, however, frequently not in the same line, and one is often smaller and less developed than the other.
In addition to the above peculiarities, we may mention that the spine makes a sudden twist near the head to one side; that the bones of the head are not symmetrical; that the two sides of the mouth are unequal; that the pectoral and ventral fins of the under side are generally smaller than those of the upper; and that the dorsal and anal generally correspond to each other, the one fringing ​the whole length of the dorsal, the other that of the ventral edge of the body.
The scales are generally small; those of the Flounder, one of which is here represented, have the margin entire all round, or only slightly waved at the front edge, with no spines behind. The form is more or less round, and the appearance generally much resembles that of a scallop shell (Pecten). The concentric lines are coarse, and are divided by bands radiating from a point
behind the centre, which exhibit only transparent crystalline substance, without any trace of lines, even under a high magnifying power.
On the adaptation of the singular structure of the Pleuronectidæ to their habits, Mr. Yarrell has some interesting observations, which we shall take the liberty to quote. “The Flat-fishes and the various species of Skate are, by this depressed form of body, admirably adapted to inhabit the lowest position, and where they occupy the least space, among their kindred fishes. Preferring ​sandy or muddy shores, and unprovided with swimming-bladders, their place is close to the ground, where, hiding their bodies horizontally in the loose soil at the bottom, with the head only slightly elevated, an eye on the under side of the head would be useless; but both eyes placed on the upper surface afford them an extensive range of view in those various directions in which they may either endeavour to find suitable food, or avoid dangerous enemies. Light, one great cause of colour, strikes on the upper surface only; the under surface, like that of
most other fishes, remains perfectly colourless. Having little or no means of defence, had their colour been placed only above the lateral line on each side, in whatever position they moved, their piebald appearance would have rendered them conspicuous objects to all their enemies. When near the ground, they swim slowly, maintaining ​their horizontal position; and the smaller pectoral and ventral fins on the under side are advantageous where there is so much less room for
their action, than with the larger fins that are above. When suddenly disturbed, they sometimes make a rapid shoot, changing their position from horizontal to vertical; if the observer happens to be opposite the white side, they may be seen to pass with the rapidity and flash of a meteor; but they soon sink down, resuming their previous motionless, horizontal position, and are then distinguished with difficulty, owing to their great similarity in colour to the surface on which they rest.”
Very little variation from the common form is found in this Family, which yet is rather numerous in species: one hundred and fifty are enumerated by the Prince of Canino, which are all ​marine, and are scattered over the Mediterranean, Atlantic, and Pacific. Their flesh is generally in esteem.
Genus Rhombus. (Cuvier.)
The Turbots and Topknots are generically distinguished by the following characters. The jaws and throat (pharynx) are furnished with small, pointed, close-set teeth: the dorsal fin
commences between the upper eye and the muzzle, and extends almost to the caudal, as does the anal on the opposite side: the eyes and colour are generally on the left side.
​One of the most esteemed of British fishes is found in this genus, the Turbot (Rhomhus maximus, Linn.); which is also one of the largest species of the Family. In form it is nearly square, the head and tail being at opposite angles. Two feet in diagonal diameter may be considered as a fair size; but individuals are sometimes
found much larger. Rondelet states that he has seen one five cubits (or seven and a half feet) in length, four in breadth, and a foot in thickness. Mr. Couch notices one which weighed seventy pounds, taken in 1730, near Plymouth; and another is said to have been taken in 1832, near Whitby, weighing a hundred and ninety pounds. The left or upper side is of a dark brown hue, ​with lighter fins; the surface is studded with small bony knobs, which are not found beneath.
The Turbot is found in considerable abundance all round the British coasts, and is the subject of a valuable fishery. The trawl-net is used for its capture, and also the deep-sea line, baited with some small fishes, either such as have great tenacity of life, to keep long in motion, or else such as are attractive from their brilliant silvery hue. The Dutch pursue the Turbot with more energy and success than our own fishermen, and a large portion of the supply for the London market is taken by those enterprising foreigners. They are said to draw no less a sum than 80,000l. a year from the Billingsgate market for this fish alone, while 12,000l. to 15,000l. are paid to the Danes for lobsters to be used as sauce to the Turbots. Our own fishery is chiefly pursued on the coast of Yorkshire, Durham, and Northumberland. It continues from the beginning of April to the middle of August.
Family VIII. Cyclopteridæ.
(Suckers.)
A small Family of Fishes of little value or importance either in a commercial or scientific point of view, is distinguished under the above name by a curious sort of sucking disk, by means of which they are enabled to adhere to the rocks of the bottom, or any other substance. This disk is situated on the inferior surface of the body, and is formed by the union of the large pectorals, which are connected by a membrane. ​In some of the genera the ventrals unite with the pectorals to make the disk; in others, they form a second circular disk in immediate contact with the other. The head is usually large and more or less flattened, while the body is commonly compressed laterally. The body is smooth, destitute of scales, sometimes unctuous or slimy, and generally repulsive in appearance, though often coloured with bright hues. The snout is lengthened but obtuse. The skeleton is so soft that some members of the Family are said to dissolve after death into a mucilaginous jelly, in which hardly any trace of bone remains.
There are about forty species now known, half of which are European, and one eighth British, The others inhabit the coasts of the Atlantic and Pacific.
Genus Cyclopterus. (Linn.)
In this genus the head and body are deep, thick, and short; the back is surmounted by an elevated ridge, bearing no small resemblance to an anterior dorsal fin; this ridge is supported by several simple rays, but is covered with a hard skin. The pectorals unite with the ventrals to form a single disk beneath the throat. The whole body is covered with bony knobs or tubercles, some of which are larger, and arranged in longitudinal rows.
The Lump Sucker, or Cock-paidle (Cyclopterus lumpus, Linn.), is taken all round our shores, but is more abundant as we approach the north. It attains a foot and a half in length, and is of the most brilliant colours. The body and head have ​their superior parts variegated with shades of dark blue, bright blue, and purple; while the inferior parts, and all the fins, are of the richest orange colour. This perfection of colour, however, is only seen at the breeding season in spring; after
this is over, the red tints disappear, the blue and purple become dull, and the brilliant effect is lost. Its excellence as food is in proportion to the gaiety of its dress.
Some interesting points in the domestic economy of this fish, its parental affection and courage, have been noticed in a previous page of this work.
Family IX. Echeneididæ.
(Remoras.)
The species, about twenty in number, which compose this Family, are all included in a single genus. They are at once distinguished by a lengthened oval disk running along the top of the head, divided into two longitudinal portions by a central ridge. Across each division run many transverse plates of cartilage, having a finely toothed edge directed backwards. They either lie flat, or can be made by muscular effort to stand partially erect. The body is lengthened, and covered with small scales, ordinarily concealed by a dense coat of mucus, only perceptible to the touch if the hand be passed along the surface from the tail forwards. The mouth is wide, and opens vertically upwards; the jaws, tongue, and vomer are furnished with small teeth. There is a single dorsal placed far back, and opposite to the anal.
The species are chiefly natives of the warmer seas; two are recognised as inhabiting the Mediterranean, and a single example of one of these has been taken on the British coast.
Genus Echeneis. (Linn.)
As the technical characters of this, the only genus of the Family, have been enumerated above, they need not be repeated. We shall, therefore, content ourselves with a brief notice of the common Remora (Echeneïs remora, Linn.) of the ​Mediterranean; a specimen of which was taken by Dr. Turton from the back of a Cod at Swansea, in the year 1806. The coronal disk in this
species contains about eighteen pairs of plates; the fins are leathery, the caudal forked. The body is of a dusky hue, darker on the upper parts and paler below.
The natives of Hispaniola and Jamaica are described by the early Spanish writers as in the habit of using a species of this genus in fishing. The fisherman, carrying the Remora out in his canoe, attached around its tail a slender line of great length, and threw it overboard. The instinct of the Remora impelled it to fasten on any fish that chanced to swim by, when the owner hauling upon the line, gradually drew in both fishes, the hold of the sucker pertinaciously retaining the prey in spite of all its efforts to escape. From some observations of our own on the habits of a large West Indian species, we are inclined to believe this account, though we do not know that the device is at present employed. At Mozambique, an oriental species is said to be used in exactly the same manner for the capture of Turtle sleeping at the surface.
Family X. Ophidiadæ.
(Blade-eels.)
A small number of Fishes, by most naturalists arranged with the Eels, the Prince of Canino elevates to the rank of a Family under the above name. They resemble the Eels in having the intestine carried far backwards, the anal orifice being removed to a considerable distance from the head; and in the dorsal and anal fins meeting at the point of the tail; the skin also is covered with minute scales almost concealed by being imbedded in its substance. The gill-openings, however, are large, and the gill-covers have free motion: the rays of the dorsal are jointed, but not branched; the body is long, and generally much compressed, so that these fishes have been compared to sword-blades. Some of the species are furnished with cirri or beards, of which others are destitute. Some are opaque and of dark colours; others are delicately pellucid, tinged with carnation or rose-colour, with black fins.
About five and twenty species are known, all of which are marine, inhabiting the Mediterranean and the Atlantic. Some three or four are marked as British.
Genus Ophidium. (Linn.)
The body in this genus is eel-shaped, compressed and opaque; the head is smooth; the eyes very large; the throat furnished with cirri; there are teeth in both jaws, as well as in the palate and pharynx.
​The Bearded Ophidium (Ophidium barbatum, Linn.) is a native of the Mediterranean, but is said to have occurred on the coast of Britain. It
grows to eight or nine inches in length, and is of a silvery flesh-colour, slightly mottled with brown. It feeds on small fishes and crustacea; its flesh, though eaten, is in little esteem, being coarse and ill-flavoured.
Family XI. Murænadæ.
(Eels.)
Like the preceding Family the Eels have a serpent-like body, lengthened, and more or less cylindrical. They are covered with a thick, soft, slimy skin, in which their scales are deeply imbedded, and scarcely to be detected. The operculum and gills are concealed; the former being covered with the common skin, while the gill-aperture is very small, and placed far back. Hence, on the principle already explained, these fishes are capable of surviving a protracted deprivation of their ordinary element. The ventral fins are always wanting; as are sometimes the pectorals; the dorsal and anal are lengthened, and frequently united to the caudal, or united to the exclusion of the caudal. All the fins are ​soft and leathery. The intestines are not furnished with cæca; but the air-bladder is generally well-developed.
About one hundred and fifty species are recognised as constituting this Family, some of which are exclusively marine, others exclusively fluviatile; while others, as our own common Eels, are found in both salt and fresh waters. They are widely scattered over most parts of the globe.
One of the most curious forms of the Family is that of the Gymnotus or Electric Eel, containing a few species peculiar to the rivers of tropical South America. The species best known, which has been exhibited alive in England, attains a length of five or six feet, with a diameter of eight inches. It has the power of communicating electric shocks of such violence, that the largest animals are stunned, and even destroyed by them. The organ which possesses this truly formidable power, consists of two large bundles of tendinous fibres on each side, occupying the hinder regions of the animal's body; these are crossed at right angles by other plates of the same kind, and thus a wide and deep network of cells is formed, each filled with a tremulous jelly; the whole organ may be likened to a powerful voltaic battery. Contact is not necessary for the exercise of its powers; it is said that shocks sufficient to kill other fishes are communicated through water to a distance of five or six yards.
Genus Anguilla. (Cuv.)
The pectoral fins are well developed, though small, in this genus; the dorsal and anal are ​continuous all round the tail. The dorsal commences at a considerable distance behind the insertion of the pectorals. The gill-opening is a small slit on each side, situated just at the base of the pectoral. The upper jaw is shorter than the lower; the mouth is furnished with small teeth in each jaw, and a few at the front part of the vomer. The whole body is covered with a thick, smooth skin, well supplied with a slimy mucous secretion. The intestine is long but straight; the air-bladder is also long, and furnished near its middle with a peculiar gland. A curious pulsating sac has been recently discovered in the tail of the Eels, with regular beats, quite independent of the action of the heart; the object of this organ is the circulation of lymph, a thin colourless fluid, having much of the nature of blood, deprived of its colouring disks. Similar organs have been observed to exist in some Reptiles, particularly Amphibia.
The Eels are properly fresh-water fishes, which migrate to the sea after they have deposited their spawn in the rivers. We have three or four species, differing a little in the form of the head, but sufficiently alike both in appearance and habits to allow of one being taken as a fair sample of the rest. The most common is the Sharp-nosed Eel (Anguilla acutirostris, Yarr.), which is abundant in most of our rivers, lakes, and marshes, as in those of continental Europe. In the waters of high mountains, however, and in countries subject to severe winter's cold, the Eel is not found, as it cannot endure a very low temperature. "During intense frosts, accompanied by a piercing east wind, thousands of ​Eels, though buried in the mud, have been known to perish; and, crawling from their lurking holes
in the agonies of death, have been washed down the stream to the tideway, and thrown upon the beach.”
Much obscurity has rested upon the breeding of the Eel; but it is now ascertained that they are oviparous like most other fishes, and that the spawn is deposited in spring, either in lakes and ponds, and the higher parts of rivers, or at the mouths of the latter, where the salt water mingles with the fresh. In the earlier summer months, thousands of little Eels are seen making their way up the streams, for the most part about three inches long. In the autumn there is ​another migration of adult Eels to the sea, for the purpose of spawning. Great numbers, however, remain in the fresh waters through the winter, hiding themselves in the mud, where they become torpid till the return of mild weather.
Eels are taken in various modes. One called totting is performed by cutting a hole in the weeds, on a gravelly bottom, and placing a boat there. The fisherman is provided with a short stick, with a cord at the end, to which is attached a bunch of worms strung on worsted with a leaden plummet in the midst of them. To this curious bait, as soon as it reaches the bottom, the Eels crowd, and suck at the worms, when the tot is quickly drawn up into the boat. The Eels drop off into the boat, the tot is plunged again, and soon again comes up loaded with fish. It is a nocturnal amusement, but when the weather is favourable produces good sport.
In mill-waters many Eels are taken in the following way. A frame-work is fitted to one of the smaller gates, to which is affixed a net of very strong cord, sixty feet in length, becoming narrower towards the extremity, where a hoop-net is tied, to receive the Eels carried down by the stream. When used, the other gates are closed, the one in question only being left open. The net must be watched, and the weeds or drift wood that accumulates taken out; the Eels also must be removed at intervals, for otherwise they would be crushed to death by the force with which the rushing current packs them together. Thirty or forty stone of Eels are thus sometimes taken in one night; generally very fine ​ones, averaging a pound weight each, and some even reaching four or five pounds.
Eels are caught also by osier baskets called leaps or grigs, sunk in different parts of the stream. A new basket is never entered until it has been some weeks in the water, the smell of the wicker being, as is supposed, disagreeable to the fish. They bite freely at the hook; the best bait being small gudgeons, minnows, or sticklebacks, as being more easily gorged than larger fish, which the Eels suck off the hooks. The efficiency of the bait is increased by its being first dried by exposure to the air, as it is then less liable to be sucked off in fragments by the small fry. Larger Eels are taken with single hooks, than with forty or fifty hooks on a long line across the stream, because the best Eels swim near the bank.
In the Thames, during the spring months, Eels are taken abundantly by laying night-lines, but the mass of weeds that springs up from the bottom as the summer advances, necessitates the discontinuance of that mode of fishing; and the delicious Eel-pies, so celebrated in the neighbourhood of Hampton and Twickenham, are chiefly supplied from the canals of Holland, whence they are imported much cheaper than they can be caught even in the vicinity of the "Eel-pie houses."
During the season of its activity the Eel is a voracious feeder. Aquatic insects and their larvæ, crustacea and mollusca, the spawn of fishes, and even fishes themselves, are devoured by them. Mr. Yarrell says that the Eel will attack large Carp, seizing them by the fins, though unable ​to do them serious injury. Mr. Jesse mentions a habit which implies the union of much sagacity with voracity, and reminds us of the device of the gregarious wolves in North America, which surround a herd of bisons or deer, and gradually force them to a precipice, that, being compelled to leap down, they may be killed; after which the crafty pursuers descend and feed upon the bodies at their leisure. "A large quantity of Eels have been observed, in one of the Cumberland lakes, to form a circle round a shoal of small fish in shallow water; and after driving them to the shore, they readily caught and fed upon them. I have observed the same thing take place in the canal in Hampton Court Park."
The excellence of these fishes is well known. Immense numbers are consumed in London and other large cities; principally supplied by the Dutch. One or more Dutch boats constantly lie off Billingsgate; others run back to Holland for fresh supplies, each bringing a cargo of 15,000 to 20,000 pounds weight of live Eels.
Family XII. Syngnathidæ.
(Pipe-fishes.)
Peculiarities of structure and form, of economy and manners, render this Family, though small both in extent of species and individual dimensions, one of very great interest. Their bodies are long and slender, with the muzzle produced into a tubular snout, just as in the Fistulariadæ among the Acanthopterygii, whence, like ​them, these have obtained the name of Pipe-fishes. The body is covered with a cuirass of bony plates, generally of angular form, and so arranged that the body itself is many-sided. The gill-covers are large, but soldered down for the greatest part of their edge, leaving only a small orifice for the discharge of the water which has been respired. The gill-rays are formed in the usual manner, but the gills themselves, instead of taking the form of fringes, set in parallel series like comb-teeth, are disposed in small tufts set on the arches in pairs; a structure of which there is no other example in the whole Class.
The reproduction of the species in this Family is attended with some circumstances truly anomalous. The male acts as a sort of nurse for the rearing of the infant progeny, thus relieving his mate of the parental cares which usually devolve upon the female. For this end he has on the abdomen, extending for about two-thirds of its length, two soft flaps which fold together, and thus form a false belly or pouch. The spawn is deposited by the mother in this receptacle of her partner, where it becomes matured, and in which the young escape from the capsules. But even when active, and able to shift for themselves, the young resort, in cases of alarm, to the paternal pouch for shelter. Mr. Yarrell was assured by fishermen that if the young of the Great Pipe-fish (Syngnathus acus, Linn.) were shaken out of the pouch into the water over the side of the boat, they did not swim away, but when the parent fish was held in the water in a favourable position, the young would again enter the receptacle. The analogy ​presented by these curious fishes to the Marsupial Mammalia will doubtless occur to our readers.
One hundred species are now known to belong to this Family, all of which are marine: they are scattered over the seas and oceans of both hemispheres. Seven species are recognised as British. Two Sub-families are indicated, which are thus distinguished:
1. Pegasina. In these the body is depressed, and broad; the snout lengthened and tubular, but the mouth is placed beneath, and is moveable.
The pectorals are very large, and the ventrals are composed each of a single slender ray. The species inhabit the tropical seas of the eastern hemisphere.
2. Syngnathina. The head and body are slender and compressed; the mouth opens upward at the extremity of the snout; the ventrals are ​wanting; and the pectorals, when present, are very minute.
Genus Hippocampus. (Linn.)
The body in this singular genus is compressed or flattened laterally, and is much deeper than the tail; the muzzle is narrow and tubular, with the mouth opening at the point nearly horizontally. The profile is angular; there is one small dorsal, no caudal, and no ventrals; small pectorals, and a minute anal in the male only. The margins of the angular plates in which the body is encased are raised in ridges, and the angles form spines. The slender tail is prehensile, and enables the little fish to hold on, or to climb by the stalks of marine plants. Specimens are often dried as curiosities, and the head and fore-parts assuming somewhat of the figure of those of a miniature horse, they are commonly called Sea-horses.
A little species, the Short-nosed Sea-horse (Hippocampus brevirostris, Cuv.), is found, but in no abundance, on the shores of the British Islands. It is about five inches in length, of a pale ashy hue, with a changeable iridescence of flitting hues playing over its body, mingled with variable shades of blue: the eyes are pale yellow.
The food of this, as of kindred species, is believed to consist of minute animals and spawn, which are supposed to be drawn up the tubular mouth, by the dilatation of the throat, on the same principle that water rushes up a syringe, when a vacuum is formed by a retraction of the ​piston. The Sea-horse is sometimes found coiled up in oyster-shells.
The habits of this species in confinement have been recorded by Mr. Lukis in an interesting manner, as observed in two individuals, kept by
that gentleman in a glass vessel of sea-water at Guernsey. They were both females, and at the time of the record had been living in health twelve days in captivity, displaying actions and habits equally novel and amusing. “An appearance of search for a resting place induced me,” observes this gentleman, “to consult their wishes, by placing seaweed and straws in the vessel: the desired effect was obtained, and has afforded me much to reflect upon in their habits. They now ​exhibit many of their peculiarities, and few subjects of the deep have displayed, in prison, more sport or more intelligence.
"When swimming about, they maintain a vertical position; but the tail is ready to grasp whatever meets it in the water, quickly entwines in any direction round the weeds, and, when fixed, the animal intently watches the surrounding objects, and darts at its prey with great dexterity. When two approach each other, they often twist their tails together, and struggle to separate, or attach themselves to the weeds; this is done by the under part of their cheeks or chin, which is also used for raising the body when a new spot is wanted for the tail to entwine afresh. The eyes move independently of each other, as in the Chameleon; this, with the brilliant changeable iridescence about the head, and its blue bands, forcibly reminds the observer of that animal."
It must not be forgotten that the Chameleon entwines its prehensile tail around the twigs of plants when watching for prey, thus presenting another analogy between these highly curious animals of different Classes.
* ↑ Monocardian Animals, i. 226.
* ↑ Voyage, &c., p. 50.
* ↑ The minute pimples or wart-like eminences that thickly cover the human tongue, and give it its peculiar spongy appearance.
* ↑ The nerves which go off to the gullet, the back of the mouth and the tongue.
* ↑ Owen's Comp. Anat. ii. 230.
* ↑ Jesse's Scenes of Country Life, p. 80.
* ↑ Hand-book of Angling, 336.
* ↑ The Practice of Angling, i. 318.
* ↑ Field Sports of the North of Europe, i. 216.
* ↑ Field Sports, &c. i. 216.
* ↑ Brit. Fishes, i. 439.
* ↑ O'Gorman, i. 318.
* ↑ "It is supposed that the first taste of the admixture of fresh water gives the fish a ravenous appetite for the fly, which occasions their extraordinary jumping and easy capture. At the spot referred to, the admixture of fresh water would hardly be perceptible to our taste at half-tide, as the stream is inconsiderable, and the sea covers, at that time of tide, many hundred acres. The fish certainly forbear from their gambols at high and low water, and during the flow." Page 255.
* ↑ Field Sports, &c. i. 302.
* ↑ Wild Sports of the West, i. 195.
* ↑ New Sport. Mag. N.S. iii. 242.
* ↑ Lect. on Comp. Anat. ii. 169.
* ↑ New Sport. Mag. vol. xiii. 12.
* ↑ Scenes of Country Life, 62.
* ↑ Brit. Fishes, ii. 298.
* ↑ See p. 23.
* ↑ Jesse's Scenes of Country Life, 351.
* ↑ Yarrell's Brit. Fishes, ii. 453.