54 J. T. CUNNINGHAM. 



concluding part of the above account^ I have to point out 

 here that Myxine is not nearly so completely parasitic in its 

 habits as has generally been believed. I have found that it 

 lives for the most part concealed in soft mud, and is found in 

 very large numbers on muddy areas of the sea-bottom. There 

 is no direct evidence that it penetrates the bodies of living fish, 

 and although it is often brought to the surface in the bodies of 

 cod and haddocks which have been hooked, it is far more 

 frequently taken on the hooks themselves. It frequently 

 happens, as I have myself witnessed, that when a long line set 

 for haddocks, and baited with mussel or herring, is hauled up 

 near the mouth of the Firth of Forth, as many Myxine as 

 haddocks are hooked, sometimes fifty specimens of the former 

 being taken at one haul. I am in the habit of taking large 

 numbers of Myxine in eel-pots set on muddy ground at a 

 depth of thirty to forty fathoms off the coast of Haddington- 

 shire, and baited with dead herrings, cod, or haddock. Thus, 

 whatever the reason ma}' be why so few perfectly ripe females 

 are taken, it is not because the animals in this condition no 

 longer bore into the bodies of fish ; though the fact might be 

 explained by the ripe females ceasing to feed altogether. 



The accounts of the egg of Myxine given by Dr. Giinther 

 in his '^ Study of Fishes," in the ' British Museum Catalogue,' 

 and in his article " Icbthyology " in the ' Encyclopaedia 

 Britannica,^ 9th edition, are derived from the paper of Steen- 

 strup above quoted. 



In Robert CoUett's ' Norges Fiske,' which forms the supple- 

 mentary volume to the 'Vidensk. Selsk. Forh.' of Christiania for 

 1874, and was itself published in 1875, mention was made of 

 the distribution of Myxine, and the occurrence of its eggs. 

 Of the latter the author says that they have been obtained by 

 Professor Esmarck in the Christiania Fjord, and that they are 

 often taken on soft ground off the coast of Finmark, or found 

 in the stomachs of cod. Thinking that the eggs here referred 

 to were eggs naturally deposited, I wrote to Mr. Collett on the 

 subject, and in a very courteous reply he informed me that all 

 the eggs he had seen, and to which he referred, were destitute 



