Page:The Zoologist, 1st series, vol 4 (1846).djvu/250

1416 of the tendrils, the powerful ventral fins are then brought into play, the fish starts up and opens its capacious mouth, and so catches the unwary victim. It also pursues its prey by means of a rapid succes- sion of jerks.

There are many fish which have fleshy prolongations on their head and back besides the dory, such as the Labridae, &c., they are all low- swimming fish, and most of them frequent rocky ground and crevices, overhung with seaweed. In watching them as they pass and repass between the rocks, and when I have placed them in pools where it has been much easier to watch them, it seemed as if these fleshy pro- longations were used as instruments of touch ; but for what purpose seems doubtful. It may be to warn them from entering a crevice too small, or to give notice of what is above them.

The dory is a very gluttonous fish, and my father mentions having found in the stomach of one twelve inches and a half long, twenty-five flounders, of which few were less than two and a half inches long ; three half-grown sting fishes (Cottus scorpio), and five stones, taken apparently in the eager pursuit after its prey. The dory was so gorged, that it suffered itself to be taken by the hand.

Boar Fish, Z. Aper. A figure of this species is to be found in the 'Zoologist,' (Zool. 191). The first recorded British specimen of this fish was taken in Mount's Bay; another in 1841 was taken near Fal- mouth, but in July, 1844, two hundred specimens were taken in a trawl-net, near the Runnelstone in Mount's Bay. In July, 1845 others were caught in the same locality and were exposed for sale in Penzance market. I found it by no means a very delicate eating fish, though it was cooked in a variety of ways. The size of the specimens examined varied from five to seven inches, the depth about three, and the girth about seven inches in front of the first dorsal fin. The snout is long and capable of a still further extension of about seven- eighths of an inch. In Mr. Yarrell's figure of this species the first rays of the dorsal-fin are represented as serrated, which was not the case in any example, but the first ray of the ventral was very strongly so. The general colour of the specimens while living was a fine crim- son, delicately bright and faded into yellow, and from thence to a sil- very white as it approached the belly. In the first specimens seen there were no lateral bands as are sometimes described, but in those examined last year, they were distinctly though faintly marked : Two specimens are preserved in the Penzance Museum.

The Scabbard Fish, Lepidopus argyreus. This is a rare fish ; two