FLOUNDEK-FISIIES. 



391 



In Scania it is known as sh'itin ( - smooth, as it feels 

 smooth wlien the hand is passed over it from the 

 head to the tail) and (iiif/lrpii/d or (hi(jt'ij)i(/a (Vang, 

 Thin-girl), in Blekingo, aeeording to Nilsson sldttika 

 (Smooth Flounder) or fjdUfJundid (Sealy Flounder), 

 and in Gothland, according to Lindsthom, uladc 

 {(jhitt ^ smooth). In Svensk Zoolorji Qvkxsel and, after 

 iiim, SvARTZ called the species futu/lik fiinidni (Sole- 

 like Flounder) or (hdi/skaddd (llandline Dah). In 

 Denmark it is known as slaifc (cf. slatfa, above) and 

 isiiif/. 



The Dal) is taken together with other species in 

 Flounder-nets and seines. It also takes a Ijait. Its fla- 

 vour is considered tolerably good. It is best during 

 late autunui and winter, before the spawning-season. In 

 Dl'HAMEI.'s time", and proljably long before then, the 

 Dab had already won favour in France, and the inland- 

 ei's preferred it to the Plaice, as it could be conveyed 

 longer distances than other Flounders without losing its 

 flavour. It also bears the [n'ocess of drying and pre- 

 serving like stock-lish bettei' than tiie Plaice, says 



DUHA.MEL. (SUXDEVAI.E. .SmITT.) 



Fig-. 108. Lower pliaryngeals in PleiironecU'S ^flesiis, seen from iibovo, ami with tlie anterior end npward. Magn. ?> diani. 



In Scandinavia as throughout the north-west ot 

 Europe, north of the Spanish Peninsula, the two follow- 

 ing .species are the commonest and, therefore, the best- 

 known within the genus. They are remarkable, in the 

 first place, for the unusually great varial)ility of their cha- 

 racters, a circumstance which approximates them so clo- 

 sely to each other that Mobius and Heincke have declared, 

 not without reason, that "it may appear on closer exa- 

 mination that these two species are links in a common | 

 form-series with the finest shades of distinction. ' Com- 

 pared ^vith the preceding species they have one common 

 character in the larger size of the head in the majority 

 of cases, a character which, as ^ve have seen, generally 

 belongs to juvenile forms. In addition to this juvenile 

 character we tind a greater prevalence in them than in 

 the other species, of deviations from the generic cha- j 

 racter -which fixes the right side as the eye side: sini- 1 

 .stral and double individuals (coloured on both sides) are I 

 comparatively common in these species. 



Throughout the Scandinavian fauna, to the best of 

 our knowledge, we niav relv upon the validity of the 

 character, derived from the length of the head, l)y which ; 

 the Dab is distinguished in the above scheme from the 

 phdessa-grouy''. But the above-mentioned Pacific form 

 of the Iimanda-grou\) apparently impairs the validity of 

 this character, and we must, therefore, have recourse to 

 an internal character. The first internal character that 



presents itself is the structure of the lower pharyngeals 

 and their teeth. In all the Flounders of which we have 

 already treated, the lower pharyngeals are narrow, and 

 more or less resemble branchial arches, while their teeth 

 are pointed. In the two following species and their nearest 

 relatives these bones are broader and more or less tri- 

 angular, and their inner margins are more or less con- 

 tiguous at the middle of the floor of the pharynx. They 

 are also furnished with obtuse, broad, molar teeth, some- 

 times arranged as closely as cobble-stones in a road^vay 

 (fig. 108). Another character may be derived from the 

 structure of the .skull — but in this respect we have 

 e.xamined only three species of the PIatessa-grou\:). Start- 

 ing from the Pole {PL c/jiioglossus) we have seen the 

 cranial part of the skull gradually gro-\v longer and 

 longer in proportion to the facial part thereof. This 

 relation is shown above by a comparison between the 

 length of the upper orbit and the total length of the 

 skull. In the Pole and the Lemon Dab the length of the 

 upper orljit measures about ' j, in the Common Dab only 

 ^ ,,, of the length of the skull from the tip of the head 

 of the vomer to the occipital foramen. In adult exam- 

 ples of the following species, on the other hand, this 

 proportion is only slightly more than '/g (about 34 

 or 35 %). The natural relation between the preceding 

 species and the following ones becomes clearer, how- 

 ever, after we have studied the latter. 



" Tvaite den Peches, sect. IX, ('hnii. I, article V. 

 *■ The subgenus Platessa of some authors. 



