Mr. J. Hogg on the common Tunny. S13 



*• Last September and October I took a rapid run on the continent 

 up the Rhine, — Heidelberg, Baden Baden, Basle, Soleure, Bern, 

 Interlaken, the Simraenthal, Vevay, Geneva, over the Jura to Dijon, 

 Fontainebleau, Paris, and home. The season was late ; flowers mostly 

 over, and deciduous ferns killed down, so that on the Alps I did not 

 gather Woodsia alpina as I wished. I found on the Jura in one spot 

 my favourite Aspl. fontanum. In the Pine forests of the Alps and 

 Jura, Polystichum Lonchitis grows in the most wonderful luxuriance ; 

 I have dried some fronds 22 inches long ! Its appearance is quite 

 beautiful ; I dried a good deal and brought away some live roots. 

 Aspl. septentrionale too abounded on the alpine rocks. I found Helix 

 obvoluta at Heidelberg at the foot of the walls of the Castle amongst 

 grass, and also at Thun in a wood. Helix Pomatia was very com- 

 mon and abundant everywhere." 



Read also a Letter addressed to the Secretary by John Hogg, 

 Esq., F.R.S., F.L.S. &c., dated " Stockton-on-Tees, December 27th, 

 1 854," of which the following is an extract : — 



" Since my return home, I have had an opportunity of learning 

 more particularly respecting the large fish which was stranded last 

 September in the Tees Bay ; and I have now not the least doubt 

 that it was a common Tunny, and that too of a large size. One of 

 the fishermen who had seen the fish, on cutting it said — the flesh 

 looked like highly salted bacon, i. e. red with salt or saltpetre. He 

 described it in size as * being pretty well on to 60 stone,' which at 

 8 lbs. to the stone (meat weight) would give 480 lbs. The only 

 freshly killed Tunny I ever saw was at Palermo ; it was a good- sized 

 fish and was carried on the shoulders of two strong fishermen, the 

 one walking a few feet before the other. Pennant describes in his 

 * Brit. Zool/ (edit. 1812), vol. iii. p. 362, one which was caught at 

 Inverary in 1769, as weighing 460 lbs. This then would probably 

 be somewhat less than the Tees fish ; and this is further shown by 

 the following fact —Pennant says the tail * measured 2 feet 7 inches 

 between tip and tip * of its crescent-form. I yesterday measured the 

 tail of the Tees fish, which gave 2 ft. 8^ inches from tip to tip, thus 

 having 1 J inch more in the width of the crescent-tail than Pennant's, 

 and consequently most likely it was the larger of the two. The 

 fisherman had well preserved the tail, and it presents a beautiful 

 specimen of a crescent, and very perfect, each half corresponding in 

 a very accurate manner with the other. It is covered with a thick, 

 nearly black skin, and quite smooth. I counted the caudal rays, and 

 Bt first I made nineteen on one side and eighteen on the other ; but 

 on re-counting them I am more satisfied that they are equal, i. e. 

 eighteen on each side or in each half. Between them I noticed most 

 distinctly *a cartilaginous keel between the sides of the tail,' as 

 described by Cuvier in his generic characters of his genus Thynnus. 

 Moreover, the fisherman (who is a very sensible man and a good 

 bird-stufi^ier) on being shown Mr. Yarrell's figure of the Common 

 Tunny, immediately recognized it and pronounced it at once to be 

 the same fish." 



