8o DESCRIPTION of the 



came down now and then to divert himfelf with fifhing, 

 that, in 40 years obfcrvation, he had never feen a bay ale- 

 wife without the loufe. The chad beein to return from 

 the frelli water lean and Jhotten, about the end of May 

 and beginning of June, and continue defcending during 

 the remaining fummer months. No one attempts then 

 to catch them, for they are unfit for the table. "Whether 

 the bay alev.'ife returns with the chad, I could not learn, 

 but it is certain tliat after June it is not thought worth 

 the trouble to catch them. No one could tell me pofi- 

 tively whether the onifcus flill continues with them, 

 but it was the opinion of my informant, that, like every 

 other parafitc, he dcferts his protcdor in his reduced 

 ftate, for he could not recoiled that he had ever feen 

 him in the mouth of thofe accidentally caught in the 

 feine in July or Auguft. 



I conlidcr, therefore, the natural hiftory of the onifcus, 

 which I now communicate, as very imperfecl ; and it 

 were to be wifhed that fome lover of natural fcience 

 would foUov/ up the enquiry, by endeavoring to af- 

 certain whether he continue with, or quit the fifli 

 before his return to the ocean, and alfo whether he be 

 the onifcus phyfodes of Linnaeus, qui habitat in pelago. 



Should he be an infect hitherto undefcribed, 1 think 

 he might be very aptly named 07iifcus pragujlator. 



The bay alewife is not accurately defcribed in any 

 ichthyological work which I have feen ; nor can 1 from my 

 drawings, which were made with a very weak hand, ven- 

 ture a defcription. From his having a regular pras- 

 guftator, I would fuggefl: that he ought to be named 

 dupe a tyr annus. 



The onifcus refembles the minion of a tyrant in other 

 refpeds, for he is not without thofe v^Vofuck him. Many 

 of thofe which I caught had two or three leaches on their 

 bodies, adhering fo clofely, that their removal coft 



them 



