SHORT GREY MULLET. 245 



ACANTHOPTERYGIL M.UGILJDM. 



THE SHORT GREY MULLET. 



Mngil curtus, YAHRELL. 



,, ,, Cuv. et VALENC. Hist. Nat. des Poiss. t. xi. p. 70. 



,, JENYNS, Brit. Vert. p. 376. 



AT the date of the publication of the History of Bri- 

 tish Fishes, but one species of Grey Mullet had been 

 described and figured as belonging to the British coast ; 

 but this was probably owing to the want of close comparative 

 examination of specimens from different localities. Cuvier, 

 in the Regne Animal, says the European Mullets have 

 not been well determined ; and from the general distribu- 

 tion* of the species of this genus, it is not unlikely that 

 more than those at present known may yet be made out. 

 The Prince of Musignano, as before mentioned, has de- 

 scribed and figured five species belonging to the Mediterra- 

 nean ; but the Small Grey Mullet of the present article 

 appeared to be then unknown, at least as far as I have been 

 able to ascertain by existing descriptions. Its principal 

 distinction, as a species, is in the extreme shortness of the 



* Species belonging to the genus Miigil of authors have been found more or 

 less plentiful at the Cape cle Verd Islands, Caspian Sea, Japan, New South 

 Wales, Sandwich Islands, and in the Bay of Mexico, besides the other locali- 

 ties that have been previously named. 



