508 FISHES. 



silver colour, with a slight varying cast of gold-green along the sides, 

 which are generally marked in the direction of the lateral line by a 

 row of long dusky spots ; the scales are very small, oval, and trans, 

 parent ; the pinnules or spurious fins are small, and are five in 

 number both above and below. The shape of the mackrel is highly 

 elegant, and it is justly considered as one of the most beautiful of 

 the European fishes. Its merit as an article of food is universally 

 established, and it is one of those fishes which have maintained 

 their reputation through a long succession of ages ; having been 

 highly esteemed by the ancients, who prepared from it the parti- 

 cular condiment or sauce known to the Romans by the title of ga- 

 rum^ and made by salting the fish, and after a certain period, strain- 

 ing the liquor from it. This preparation, once so famous, has been 

 long superseded by the introduction of the anchovy, for similar 

 purposes. 



[Willoughby* Pennant* Shazo. 



SECTION VI. 



Remoray or Sucking-Fish, 

 Echeneis reraora. Linn. 



The extraordinary faculty which this fish possesses, of adhering 

 at pleasure with the utmost tenacity to any moderately flat surface, 

 was not unobserved by the ancients, and is described in terms of 

 considerable luxuriance by Pliny in particular, who, giving way to 

 the popular prejudices of his time, represents the remora as pos- 

 sessing the power of stopping a vessel in full sail, so as to render 

 it perfectly immoveable in the midst of the sea. 



" Ventum est ad summa natures^ SfC, 



Let the reader take the translation in the words of Philemon 

 Holland. 



<c Having so far proceeded in the discourse of Nature's historie, 

 that I am now arrived at the very height of her forces, and come into 

 a world of examples, 1 cannot chuse but in the first place consider 

 the power of her operations, and the infininesse of her secrets, 

 which offer themselves before our eyes in the sea : for in no part 

 else of this universal frame is it possible to observe the like majestie 

 of nature : insomuch as we need not seeke any farther, nay we 

 ought not to make more search into her divinitie, considering there 



