392 



MUB/ENID.E. 



water, though the Whitebait-net does not clip more than 

 about three feet below the surface. 



Eels appear to be slow of growth, not attaining greater 

 length than twelve inches during the first year, and do not 

 mature roe till the second or third year. The sharp-nosed 

 species, however, acquires a large size. I saw at Cambridge 

 the preserved skins of two which weighed together fifty 

 pounds ; the heaviest twenty-seven pounds, the second twen- 

 ty-three pounds. They were taken on draining a fen-dyke 

 at Wisbeach. No other fish of any sort was found in that 

 dyke. 



Ely is said to have been so named from rents being for- 

 merly paid in Eels : the lords of manors in the isle were 

 annually entitled to more than 100,000 Eels. A stich or 

 stick of Eels was twenty-five ; and the practice of stringing 

 Eels on tough slender willow-twigs, put in at the gill-aperture 

 and out at the mouth, still prevails in Dorsetshire among 

 those who carry Eels about for sale from house to house 

 one, two, or three pounds 1 weight being thus strung on a 

 stick, to suit different customers. El more on the Severn 

 obtained its name from the immense number of Eels which 

 are taken there. 



In a Sharp-nosed Eel of twenty-two inches in length, 

 three distances taken from the point of the lower jaw arc to 



