CLASS PISCES. 181 



ScOMBEROIDES, 



Consists of a great many fish with small scales, smooth 

 bodied, with numerous cceca, often in bunches; the 

 tail, and particularly the caudal fin, are very powerful. 

 It is one of the families most useful to man, from 

 the agreeable flavour of its species, from their size, and 

 from their inexhaustible re-production, which brings 

 them periodically to the same latitudes, and makes 

 them the object of the most extensive fisheries. 



The Scombri. 



Have their first dorsal entire, whereas the latter rays 

 of the second, and also the corresponding ones of the 

 anal, are detached, and form what have been called 

 spurious fins (pinncespurice.) 



This genus is subdivided as follows : 



The Mackerel, (Scomber, Cuv) 



Have a spindle-shaped body, covered with uniformly 

 small smooth scales ; the sides of the tail turned up 

 with two cutaneous crests ; the second dorsal sepa- 

 rated from the first by an empty space. 



The common Mackerel, {Scomber scombrus, L.), Bl. 54. 



Has a blue back, with wavy black stripes, five spurious 

 fins above and below ; its flesh is very firm, and ex- 

 cellent eating : it abounds in summer on our coasts, 

 when the fisheries are almost as productive as those of 

 herrings. Sometimes they appear at other seasons : 



