364 THE PRACTICAL FISHERMAN. 



the angles of the mouth, irides reddish colour ; the jaws very narrow, 

 slightly rounded at the end, the lower jaw the longer ; nostrils with two 

 openings on each side, one tubular, the other a simple orifice ; both jaws 

 furnished with a narrow band of small teeth, gape small, various mucous 

 pores about the mouth and other parts of the head ; gill-opening a small 

 aperture immediately before, and rather below the origin of the pectoral 

 fin ; the scales on the body rather small ; dorsal fin extending over more 

 than two-thirds of the whole length of the fish, anal fin occupying more 

 than half of the whole length, both united at the end, forming a tail ; the 

 number of rays in the fins not easily ascertained from the thickness of 

 the skin ; the lateral line exhibits a long series of mucous orifices ; 

 vertebrse 113; the vent includes four distinct openings, the most 

 anterior of which leads upwards to the intestines, the posterior to the 

 urinary bladder in a direction backwards, and one elongated lateral 

 opening on each side communicating with the cavity of the abdomen, as 

 in other bony fishes. 



Anguilla Hibernica, or the Dublin eel, is described as a distinct 

 species from the others, and although it bears a close resemblance to the 

 foregoing, I am induced on examination to believe that our foremost 

 ichthyologists are right in classing it in a distinctive way. It seems to 

 approximate to a species termed by Cuvier Anguilla longbec. Thompson 

 says that he observed an eel from Stranford, which he believed to be 

 different from the recognised British eels. It is to be especially noticed 

 that the Dublin fish (a specimen of which I had from the Liffey, from 

 which water the one described by Couch was also obtained) , is shorter 

 in the muzzle or snout, and the lateral line is more plainly marked than 

 in the A. acutirostris. 



The specimen I obtained measured two feet, its body was, if anything* 

 not so attenuated as the A. acutirostris, but broader and more rounded ; 

 the head was wide, flat, and sloping forward to a snout, which was very 

 narrow ; the under jaw long and wide, but not nearly so muscular or so 

 large in bone as the A. acutirostris and, of course, not nearly so as the 

 A. latrirostris. The pectoral fins were larger, and the jaws more thickly 

 studded with sharp teeth than the other species. Colour, brownish 

 green, and whitish below ; tail very dark at its border. 



The broad-nosed eel (A. latrirostris) seems identical with the "slug " 

 eel of Thames fishermen, and is of a widely different appearance, being 

 thicker, coarser skinned, and broader-headed than either of the others. 

 Its appetite is also more voracious, and of a much less particular kind. 

 It will devour dead flesh and such garbage, even after it has become 

 tainted. The following are its points : 



The broad-nosd eel has the head rounded at the back part, and 



