198 RIBBON FISH AT OEKNEYS. 



sufficiently apparent to enable us in some manner to 

 restore it. The back is studded with sharp webbed 

 spines forming a continuous back fin. The belly is 

 covered with little ivory studs ; the body is excessively 

 fragile, and breaks up into small portions like over- 

 cooked meat." 



Mr. Searle and myself made two casts of it, which 

 are now in my museum at South Kensington. To 

 preserve this huge fish in spirits would be impossible. 



Mr. Bartlett tells me that he has seen in the Bergen 

 Museum, Norway, a specimen of the same species, but 

 of smaller size than that sent me by Mr. Traill. 



A correspondence took place on this subject in Land 

 and Water (vol. xvii., Jan. to June, 1874). 



My friend Mr. W. Eeid, of Wick, gives the following 

 valuable information : — " Mr. Buckland mentions that 

 only one vaagmaer is recorded as having been found in 

 Orkney. While I resided in these islands I procured no 

 less than three specimens, two of them in perfect condi- 

 tion (a thing very rare, I admit), the other sadly mutilated 

 by sea-gulls. The two specimens — one measuring 4|- 

 feet, the other about a foot less — I preserved for a local 

 museum, which we had started some twenty-five years 

 since in Kirkwall. I made a drawing of one of the fish 

 at the time on tracing-paper over the body of the fish, 

 and it gave an excellent idea of the size and outline of 

 this very curious-looking species. Couch had com- 

 menced publishing his ' British Fishes ' about the 

 time, and I sent the drawing to him, and I believe that 

 it was from it that he fii^ured the deal-fish in his 

 excellent work. I enclose a diminished copy of the 

 same drawing, which, I believe, will correspond with 

 Couch's, although I have not the work to refer to. 

 Knowing that the deal-fish had been picked up in some 



