THE SENSE-OEGANS AND PERCEPTION OF FISHES. 247 



fied, s-wi'm under the food so as to touch it with their noses and pre- 

 sumably smell it ; and this gesture is often performed by individuals 

 in which the olfactory organs have been destroyed, probably by force 

 of habit. Mullet examine food by sucking water from it, and bass, 

 bream, &c., touch doubtful food with their lips before seizing it. 

 Plaice, turbot, blennies, and wrasses do not seem to make any pre- 

 liminary examination of the flavour before taking food into their 

 mouths. The importance of the olfactory organs to such animals as 

 these is therefore obscure. 



The range of tastes and scents which fishes are capable of per- 

 ceiving- seems to be very small. Conger are equally willing to eat 

 a piece of squid or pilchard if it is covered or smeared with spirit, 

 trimethylamine, turpentine, iodoform, camphor spirit, cheese of 

 various sorts, anchovy extract, or Balanoglossiis* as if it had been 

 unpolluted. On the other hand, they will refuse cooked or tainted 

 food and food -which has been soaked for a few moments in dilute 

 acids. The same remarks apply generally to the other fishes. None 

 of them paid the slightest heed to stones or other objects covered 

 with any of the substances mentioned. I was particularly surprised 

 that none of the fishes in the tanks took notice of rogue — the fer- 

 mented roe of the cod, which has a most powerful odour, and is used 

 with great success to attract sardines by the fishermen of Brittany 

 — but of course none of my fish were Glujpeidse. It is supposed by 

 the sardine fishermen that the odour is of great importance, and 

 must be of the right quality. Hence it may be imagined that it 

 does not merely attract the sardines by sight. 



In this place mention should be made of the fact that some of the 

 Gadidse, which are, generally speaking, day feeders, are sometimes 

 taken with a bait at night. At certain times of the year this is the 

 recognised mode of catching hake {Merluccius vulgaris) , while occa- 

 sionally whiting are so taken. In both these cases the bait is sent 

 down about halfway to the bottom, and not, as usually, to within a 

 fathom of it. I was assured by fishermen that this mode of feeding 

 is a most exceptional thing with whiting, and is supposed to be con- 

 nected with the continued prevalence of calms, for under ordinary 

 circumstances whiting-catching is not continued after dusk. In addi- 

 tion to these instances it sometimes happens that large pollack are 

 taken on ground-lines by night. Whether in these cases the food 

 is found by sight or by smell there is no evidence to show, for both the 

 pollack and the whiting living in the tanks seem unable to find food in 



* As the disgusting smells emitted by various species of Balanoglossus may be thought 

 to be protective, I tested various fishes with pieces of a single damaged specimen of B. 

 salmoneus which was dredged in Plymouth Sound. It was refused by both mullet and 

 wrasse after trial, but was eaten by a sole and by a plaice. 



