Page:Natural History, Fishes.djvu/267

Rh 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. "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