THE SHORT SUNFISH. Ill 



vendere,) because they were carried about for sale early in the 

 morning. Gesner, who gives this derivation, was the first, in 1558, 

 to describe and figure the vshort and the oblong Sunfish, the latter 

 being about twice as long as broad; he says he has heard the 

 grunting of the fish, and seen its phosphorescence by night, it 

 grows to the size of four, five, or six cubits. He adverts to its 

 being taken in various parts of the Mediterranean, and once off 

 the Cape de Verde Islands. He had heard of one that was said 

 to be as big as two oxen, and so strong that even ships were over- 

 whelmed by the resistless stroke of its fins ! 



La Cepede, in 1798, names the fish Tetrodon Lune. It is 

 called, he says. Sun or Moon, from its disk-like form and phos- 

 phorescence. It reflects the sunlight strongly, so that it is bright, 

 even in day time, but in the dark it shines with a phosphoric 

 splendour all its own. Shoals of the fish have been seen at night, 

 presenting a most interesting tremulous illumination, beneath 

 the agitated waves of the ocean. It makes a well-marked purring 

 sound like the Tetrodons. It attains a diameter of 12 feet; one, 

 said to be 25 feet long, was caught, in 1735, off the Irish coast. 

 Its weight is said to reach 300 or even 500 pounds. La CepMe 

 believes the short and the oblong to be varieties of the same 

 species. 



Shaw calls the sunfish Ceplialus, from its resemblance to the 

 head of a fish, and mentions a new species, C Pallasianus, as 

 inhabiting tropical seas, and being only a few inches long. 



In Griffitlii Cuvier the old name has been restored, and a specific 

 one, Mola, added, derived from one name of the fish at and about 

 Marseilles, namely mole.'^ Two other species are noticed, but 

 scarcely any description of them given. 



Professor Jacob has given in the Dublin Philosopliiccd Journal, 

 1836, the most detailed account of the anatomy of the Sunfish 

 that I have met with, and in the second volume of Professor 

 Owen''s Lectures on Comparative Anatomy, are to be found many 

 valuable facts relating to its internal structure. 



This curious fish, which vies occasionally, as it would appear 



* Other French names are Molebont and Bout ; it seems probable that the 

 term lout may be the origin of the English terminal but, occurring in names 

 of fishes, as in Holibut. 



