MYTILID^E. MUSSEL. 63 



Dr. Knapp informed Messrs. Forbes and Hanley that 

 the quantity of mussels consumed in Edinburgh and 

 Leith is about 10 bushels per week, " say for forty 

 weeks in the year, in all 400 bushels annually. Each 

 bushel of mussels, when shelled and freed from all 

 refuse, will probably contain from 3 to 4 pints of the 

 animals, or about 900 to 1000, according to their size. 

 Taking the latter number, there will be consumed, in 

 Edinburgh and Leith, about 400,000 mussels. This is 

 v a mere trifle compared to the enormous number used 

 as bait for all sorts of fish, especially haddocks, cod, 

 ling, halibut, plaice, skate, &c. ; and at Newhaven the 

 total consumption of mussels for bait may be reckoned 

 at 4,320,000 annually. There are nearly as many used 

 at Musselburgh, Fisherrow, &c.. and other places on 

 the Frith of Forth, and we may calculate that 30,000,000 

 or 40,000,000 of mussels are used for bait alone by the 

 fishermen of that district each year."* 



We learn from Mr. P. Wilson, late Inspector of 

 Fisheries at Eyemouth, in Scotland, that in one week 

 alone, sixty-one tons of mussels were used for baiting 

 the long lines, by the boats from the fishing stations of 

 Eyemouth, Burnmouth, and Coldingham, the cost of 

 which was about 1 60, the produce in fish from which 

 was 25,620 stone, worth 2500. f 



Mussels are considered to be the best bait for salt- 

 water fish, and will keep alive two days, when taken 

 from the shell, and suspended on a hook in sea- 

 water. 



The mussel has the power of attaching itself by means 

 of its ' ' byssus/' to rocks and stones ; and we read that 



* Forbes and Hanley, ' British Mollusca,' vol. ii. pp. 174, 175. 

 f 'Molluscs, Mussels, Whelk?, &c./ by Charles Harding. 



