BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 175 



87.- WHAT COOFISH SO:nE:TIITIX:S SWAIil^OTF.* 



By CAPT. J. W. COI.L.IIVS. 



[From a letter to Prof. S. F. Baird.] 



I send by to-day's express a knife, apparently of the kind known as 

 a " haddock rii^per," which was taken from the stomach of a large cod- 

 fish on Le Have Bank. The knife was presented by Captain Henry 

 McEachern, of the schooner A. F. Giffbrd, of this port, through Capt. 

 Benjamin F. Blatchford. Captain McEachern stated to me that the 

 knife was found in the stomach of a 45-pound cod which was caught 

 this winter on a trawl-line, in about 55 to 60 fathoms of water, latitude 

 43° 08' north, longitude 64° 11' west. As Captain McEachern is consid- 

 ered very reliable, there is no reason for doubting the correctness of his 

 statement, though it does seem strange that a fish should swallow such 

 an implement. 



Gloucester, Mass., January 26, 1884. 



88.— liEECn CUIiTURE. 

 By RUB. HESSEL.. 



[From a letter to Prof. S. F. Baird.] 



The Hirudo medicinalis and the S. officinalis begin to propagate when 

 three or four years old, at which age they are from three to five inches 

 in length and from half an inch to an inch in diameter. 



They are raised extensively in France, especially on the moss-lands 

 in the environs of Bordeaux, where the culturists call the adult worm 

 by the unscientific name of Sangsue vache, " cow-leech." I have seen 

 all the difierent kinds of ponds in use there, as well as in other parts 

 of France, and in the Danube province of Austria-Hungary. 



I once laid out some ponds on my place especially adapted to the 

 habits of the leeches, and to protecting them from their enemies. I 

 then bought 10,000, including both species, one of which I got from 

 Bordeaux and the other from Hungary. Two years afterwards, when 

 my establiwshmeut was washed away by a freshet, I had about 100,000, 

 about 60,000 of which were of marketable size. 



For the trial which you are intending to make, from 150 to 250 would 



* There is in the National Museum a package of 15 or 20 cards of the usual size of 

 playing-cards (2f by 4 inches) which were taken from the stomach of a codfish. The 

 comers are well rounded off, but the colors are in quite a good state of preservation. 

 The cards were exhibited at the London Fishery Exhibition, and the fact that they 

 came from the stomach of a cod is well authenticated. — C. W. S. 



