ioo THE COMMERCIAL SEA FISHES OF 



Pectoral sickle-shaped, nearly or quite as long as the head. 

 Second pre-anal spine the strongest. Scales. Very small. 

 Lateral-line. Makes a curve to beneath the first third of 

 the second dorsal fin ; in the curved portion of its course 

 it is crossed by large scale-like plates, deeper than wide, 

 which become more indistinct in the adult. In its straight 

 portion these plates, 34 to 40, are keeled, becoming most 

 strongly so posteriorly. The number of these plates is 

 subject to great variation. Colours. Of a dark bluish along 

 the back and so low as the lateral-line, beneath which it 

 becomes silvery, glossed with purple and gold. A diffused 

 black spot on the opercle. 



Varieties. Edward remarks that he once found a rather 

 strange variety of this species in Banffshire. It was about 

 the usual size, but of a most beautiful golden colour, finely 

 striped and variegated with numerous lines of the brightest 

 blue, except the fins, which were of the finest carmine. 



Habits. Adults are more solitary in their habits than 

 are the young, and they swim low in the water. In the 

 colder months they retire to the deep, reappearing on our 

 coasts about April, when they become one of our com- 

 monest fish. They are very uncertain in their migrations, 

 perhaps owing to their possessing a great sensibility to 

 cold and vicissitudes of temperature. On February 3rd, 

 1882 (after a very mild winter), some were present in the 

 Exeter market. Thus Parnell observes that in 1833 and 

 1834 scarcely an example was observed in the Firth of 

 Forth, while they were in prodigious . numbers on the 

 English and Welsh coasts. Off Glamorganshire, on the 

 evening of July 24th, 1834, the whole sea as far as could be 

 seen appeared to be in a fermentation from their numbers. 

 These immense shoals continued passing up channel for 

 a week. Devoured themselves in large numbers by sea- 



