Page:Natural History, Fishes.djvu/325

Rh dance, the fishermen universally believe that the Dog-fish make a line or semicircle, to encompass a shoal of Haddocks and Cod, confining them within certain limits near the shore, and eating them as occasion requires. Haddocks and Cod are always found near the shore, without any Dog-fish among them; and the Dog-fish are found farther off, without any Haddocks or Cod; and yet the former are known to prey upon the latter; and, in some years, they devour such immense numbers as to render this fishery more expensive than profitable."

In the flattened form of the Saw-fish (Pristis), and in the great enlargement of the pectorals in the Angel (Squatina), we saw distinct approaches made by the Family of the Sharks to that of the Rays. In these the pectorals are enormously dilated, their bases, which are continuous with the body, extending from the base of the tail to the head, and sometimes stretching out in front of the head in the form of lobes. Hence the ordinary shape of these fishes is more or less rhomboidal, or square, the snout forming one corner, and the tail projecting from the opposite, the other two corners being the angles of the pectoral fins. The body is broad, but thin and flat; and a common skin invests both it and the fins: the ventrals are commonly large, and in the males are furnished with appendages resembling those