GRAYLING. 



283 



we add that the difference of habit which is associated with 

 its power ol rising and falling in the water, and its want of 

 power to spring aloft are clearly connected with the expansion 

 of its Avide dorsal fin, and also with the comparative structure 

 or arrangement of the bones of the tail, so characteristic in 

 general of the fishes of this extensive family; as in them the 

 line of the vertebra? is directed upward, so that the setting on 

 of the larger number of the bones and their rays is on their 

 lower side, as we have described in the proper genus Salmo ; 

 but these connecting bones are in this instance slight and 

 feeble, and ill adapted to a strenuous leap; but the rays of 

 the upper lobe of the tail are connected with the termination 

 of these vertebrae, and not the side, without the intervention 

 of a plate as in most fishes; and those of the lower lobe are 

 attached to the vertebra anterior to the place where they are 

 turned upward, the middle rays of this organ being united to 

 bones which are too slender to be termed plates, although they 

 are a little wider than what we may properly term rays; which 

 structure is sufficient for what will act in progression, even of 

 a rapid kind, but not for the stronger effort of leaping. 



This fish is reported to be scattered over Europe, and some 

 portion of Asia, and from the high north of Lapland, Norway, 

 and Sweden, through Germany and Hungary to France, even 

 to the more southern parts, with Switzerland and the north of 

 Italy; but in these latter countries they are only met with in 

 the cooler departments, where the streams are at rather high 

 elevations, although not near glaciers, and a heat much above 

 fifty degrees is as fatal to them as severe cold. It is said also 

 they inhabit the Caspian Sea, and are found in the Baltic, 

 from whence they proceed up through the course of the rivers 

 to deposit their spawn; but on trial it was found by Sir 

 Humphrey Davy that with us even brackish water was fatal to 

 them. And indeed so different are the habits of the Grayling 

 as described by Nilsson, (and which v/e will presently give 

 from him) from those of our own country, that we are disposed 

 to believe with Sir Humphrey Davy, that this northern fish is 

 a different species. 



With us the time of spawning is about April, and the roe 

 is cast on stones and gravel without being buried below the 

 surface, as is the case with that of many fishes of this family. 



