GREENLAND BULLHEAD. 13 



"The Cottus Grmnlandicus is admirably described in Richard- 

 son's 'Zoology of British America,' known as the Greenland 

 Bullhead — the Kaniock and Kanininock of the Greenlanders. 

 The colours of the specimen here figured were extremely 

 beautiful — the shades of the head Vandyke brown, the deeper 

 umber beautifully glazed over with a pinkish or violet tinge, 

 the dorsal and above the lateral line more or less shaded and 

 spotted towards the tail, and leaving a line of numerous papillae 

 or tubercles (altogether absent in C. Scorpius) below the lateral 

 line; large and irregularly formed white spots mark the sides, 

 shaded around with deep carmine and a rich chocolate brown, 

 the tinge towards the belly passing into rich orange; the belly 

 is also marked along the line to the tail with a row of roundish 

 white spots ; pectoral fins beautifully shaded and barred, sj)otted 

 with white, the terminal portion and margins of a rich orange, 

 resembling and emulating in beauty the rich colouring of the 

 tiger-moth; irides of a deep golden yellow, tinged and marked 

 with orange. The posterior portions of the rays of the pectoral 

 and ventral fins are rough, with ciliated or minute spinous 

 processes, which seem to be characteristic, and are not present 

 in C Scorpius or C. Buhalis, the rays in those sjDccies being 

 smooth on both sides." 



Crantz, the historian of Greenland, who calls this fish the 

 Sea Scorjiion, says that its resort is in the deeper water of the 

 bays of that country, where it is fished for with long lines; 

 the bait being a white bone, a glass bead, or piece of red 

 cloth; and that it is esteemed as food; being also sometimes 

 employed as a material for soup. 



I suppose it highly probable that the account which Lacepede 

 has given us of the fish he calls Le Cotte Scorpion, and which 

 in his day was judged to be the same with the Greenland 

 Bullhead, was derived from observations that had been made 

 on the habits of the last-named species; for they certainly will 

 not apply to those of our more common Father-lasher. He 

 says, in regard to its haunts, that they extend to both sides 

 of the Atlantic, and so far north as to near the Arctic Circle. 

 It is very active, and swift in the pursuit of prey, which it 

 follows even to the surface; in which it differs from the 

 generality of the fishes of this genus, but the fact is established 

 on the evidence of later observers. Its victims are the blennies. 



