256 MALACOPTERYGII. — GADID^. 



eagerness to get to the place where they are 

 usually fed, just as barn-door fowls do at the 

 sight of the person who feeds them. We came 

 provided with a quantity of mussels, scalded, for 

 the purpose of getting them more easily from the 

 shell, a kind of food on which the Cod and other 

 fish in the pond thrive amazingly ; and I was 

 informed that after having been thus stall-fed^ — 

 if I may so term it, — for a few weeks, they greatly 

 exceed in flavour and juiciness their untamed 

 brethren of the open sea. I held a mussel between 

 my fingers, about two inches below the surface of 

 the water, and immediately a Cod of about ten 

 pounds weight took it, winning the prize by a 

 head from three or four more of similar dimensions, 

 all of which rushed towards my hand at the same 

 time. It required all the nerve I could muster 

 to prevent me from jerking back my hand at the 

 moment the Cod, with widely extended jaws, took 

 the bait. I made several attempts to get hold of 

 one of them, but they all slipped from my grasp, 

 except one small Cod of about four or five pounds 

 weight, which I succeeded in making a prisoner. 

 Having raised him out of the water and examined 

 him at my leisure, I returned him to his native 

 element, at which he seemed as much pleased as 

 I should have been in regaining terra-Jirma after 

 an involuntary immersion. There was one large 

 Cod of about ten pounds weight that I made 

 several attempts to get hold of without success, 

 as from his great size and strength he always 

 escaped, and as he could not throw dust in my 

 eyes, he revenged himself by darting ofl* with a 

 whisk of his tail that sent the water flying over 

 me. After taking a short run, he always returned 



