28 5 



coast, or into our bays, unless their progress were checked 

 by any extraneous causes. 



Passing on next to consideration of the fishes which we 

 possess, belonging to the cod family, what are the chief 

 characteristics of their food ? They may be found of 

 surface and littoral forms, and along our coasts at depths 

 rarely exceeding 1 20 or 150 fathoms, while the common 

 cod, Gadus morrhua y is noted for its omnivorous appetite. 

 The cod will consume small fish, or the young of its own 

 kind, or of any other that they can capture ; but seem to 

 be especially partial to sand-eels, herrings (which they will 

 tear out of the nets), and their spawn, and sprats : while 

 Leach found six dog-fishes inside one of these fish. Crusta- 

 ceous and testaceous animals also, as is well known to 

 fishermen, evidently prefer one kind of animal food to 

 another, being very partial to crabs and whelks, while their 

 digestion is so powerful that the greater portion of the 

 shells they swallow are dissolved. Various, indeed, have 

 been the contents of the stomach of these fishes ; an entire 

 partridge has been taken from one, a hare from another, 

 and a black guillemot from a third ; while from two others 

 have been removed a piece of tallow candle, and a white 

 turnip, irrespective of a bunch of keys ; stones are frequently 

 found inside these fish, having been probably swallowed in 

 order to obtain the corallines which were attached to them, 

 the stones being subsequently ejected. They will eat almost 

 any kind of crab, indeed, almost any kind of animal food. 

 Dr. M'Intosh obtained the following food from cod-fishes 

 captured at St. Andrews. 



A zoophyte, Thelepus Lima Loscombii, G. B. Sowerby ; 

 Mediolaria nigra, Gray ; Crenella decussata, Mont. ; Nucula 

 nucleus, Linn. ; N. nitida, G. B. Sowerby ; Circe minima, 

 Mont. ; Scrobicularia prismatica, Mont. ; 5. alba, M tiller ; 



