10 , INLAND riSHEEIES. 



with the shad, etc., has not been settled, although the former supposi- 

 tion appears the most probable. They reach the New Jersey coast 

 sometime in the early part of May, and usually appear at Newport and 

 in Vineyard Sound (the time varying with the season) from the middle 

 of May to the first week in June. They are expected at Edgartown 

 from the 25th to the 30th of May ; but I am informed that, on their 

 first arrival they feed at the bottom, and sometimes for a while are not 

 seen at the surface at all, seldom being taken with the hook, but caught 

 in large numbers in pounds and with gill-net, usually along the lower 

 edge of the net. According to Dr. Yarrow, they are not taken with 

 the hook about Beaufort until about the 1st of July. 



They do not bite, however, in Vineyard Sound until from the 10th 

 to the 15th of June, when they appear on the surface, and are caught 

 in large numbers in the usual manner." 



In the first week of May, 1878, about a thousand blue-fish, weighing 

 four pounds each, were caught off Long Island at Canarsie and West 

 Hampton. This is about two months earlier than is usual for them to 

 be taken in any considerRble numbers. 



^''Periodicity. — Great interest attaches to this fish in consequence of 

 the changes in its abundance, and even its actual occurrence on our 

 coast, within the historic period. The precise nature and extent of the 

 variation has not been established, nor whether it extended along the 

 entire coast or not. Its earliest mention for our waters is in the work 

 of Josselyn ('New England Rarities Displayed,' 1672,) where, on page 

 96, he mentions the 'blew-fish, or horse,' as being common in New 

 England (his residence was on the New Hampshire coast, or near by 

 in Maine,) and 'esteemed the best sort of fish next to rock-cod.' He 

 says : 'It is usually as big as the salmon, and a better meat by far.' 

 He also, on page 24, catalogues two kinds of 'blew-fish' or 'hound- 

 fish' ; the 'speckeled hound-fish' and the 'blew hound-fish, called horse- 

 fish.' 



"There appears no species to which this reference could apply except 

 the subject of our present article, this being the opiuion of Mr. J. Ham- 



