234 INTEODUCTION TO ZOOLOGY. 



merly supposed to be the young of the Shad, but has now had 

 its claims estabhshed by Mr. Yarrell to rank as a distinct 

 species (Clupea alba). The Sprat {Clupea sprattus), another 

 member of the same famil}^ is vahxed, not so much for its deU- 

 cacy as for its extreme abundance. It is taken during the 

 winter months ; the coasts of Kent, Essex, and Suffolk being 

 those which are most productive. It is not used only as an 

 article of food ; after that demand has been full}'- supplied, the 

 numbers are so great that the fish is used as manm-e. Many 

 thousand tons are in some seasons sold to farmers, at sixpence 

 to eightpence per bushel, for this purpose ; forty bushels of 

 Sprats being spread over an acre of land.* 



The Pilchard (^Clupea pilchardus) , another of the family, is 

 even more important. The number of persons to whom this 

 fishery gives employment on the Coast of Cornwall has been 

 estimated at 10,621 ; and the capital invested in boats, nets, 

 and cellars for curing, at £441,215. The quantity taken is 

 sometimes almost incredibly large. "An instance," says Mr. 

 Yarrell, "has been known where ten thousand hogsheads have 

 been taken on one shore, in one port, in a single day ; thus 

 providing the enormous multitude of twenty-five millions of 

 living creatures di-awn at once from the ocean for human sus- 

 tenance." t The vast multitudes in which they occasionally 

 appear realize the description of the poet : — 



" Forthwitli the sounds and seas, each creek and bay, 

 With fry innumerable swarm, and shoals 

 Of fish that with their fins, and shining scales. 

 Glide under the green wave, in sculls that oft 

 Bank the mid sea." — Milton. 



Ranking still higher as an object of national importance is 

 the Herring fishery, which gives occupation to thousands around 

 the British coasts, and supplies to hundreds of thousands a 

 cheap and favourite article of diet. The space to which we 



* Yarrell. 



f This calculation is made on the supposition that each hogshead con- 

 tains 2,500 fish, which is about the average quantity. It is statetl b}- 1!. Q. 

 Crouch, Esq., in a paper read by him before the Penzance Natural History 

 and Antiquarian Society, that the number of hogsheads exported for the 

 last ten years amounts to 17G,1G8, and upwards of a third more is used 

 for home consumption. During the present j'ear, 33,959 hhds. have been 

 exported — 3, 052 of which were sent to Genoa; 8,499 to Leghorn ; 1,368 

 to Civitii Vecchia ; 13,309 to Naples ; and 7,731 to the Adriatic. — Penzance 

 Gazette, 10th Feb., 1847. 



