Page:Natural History, Fishes.djvu/113

Rh are brownish; the pectorals, ventrals, and caudal are pale red. There is a blackish spot at the commencement of the lateral line. The sides of

the head gleam in parts like frosted silver, or like the back of a looking-glass newly silvered.

The scales (see the engraving on the following page) generally approach, more or less nearly, to a square form, slightly bulging at the sides; the front, or attached end, scalloped at the edge, and waved in a radiating manner: the hinder, or free end, marked with a number of minute flexible points lying one over the other, most numerous on the scales of the belly. Those of the lateral line have the mucus-tube short but wide. a, represents a scale from the back; b, one from the lateral line; c, one from the belly. The silvery pigment beneath the scales does not come off with the latter when these are detached,