GREY MULLET. 235 



several species : and according to him, the description of the 

 cephalus of Willughby and the figure of the cephalus of 

 Pennant both appear to belong to the M. capita of the 

 Regne Animal. 



This opinion, that the cephalus of Linnaeus is not the 

 true cephalus, receives support from other authors who have 

 attended to fishes. Professor Reinhardt and Nilsson each 

 refer the Grey Mullet of the Baltic and the coast of Norway 

 to the capita of Cuvier ; and the Prince of Musignano, who 

 has described and figured in his Fauna Italica five species of 

 Grey Mullets as belonging 'to the Mediterranean, including 

 both cephalus and capita, makes no reference to Linnseus in 

 his account of cephalus, and considers his capito as identical 

 with the cephalus of Pennant. 



Mugil cephalus is distinguished by having its eyes partly 

 covered with a semi-transparent membrane adhering to the 

 anterior and posterior edges of the orbit, and also by a large 

 elongated triangular scale pointing backwards, placed just 

 over the origin of the pectoral fin on each side. A dried 

 specimen of this fish from the Mediterranean, now be- 

 fore me, exhibits both these peculiarities, which M. capito 

 does not possess. The vignette below represents the ap- 

 pearance of the pectoral fin, and the superposed trian- 

 gular scale of M. cephalus, both for the purpose of supply- 

 ing the means of comparison Avith our common Grey Mullet, 

 in which the pectoral fin-scale is short and blunt, and to 

 enable observers to identify the true cephalus, should it occur 

 on our coast ; which is not improbable, when it is recollected 



