THE SMELT. 



75 



ABDOMINAL 

 MALACOPTERYGII. 



SALMONIDX. 



THE SMELT. 



SPIELING AND SPARLING. Scotland. 



Osmerus eperlanus, Smelt, FLEM. Brit. An. p. 181, sp. 48. 



Eperlanus Rondeletii, 

 ,, Schonfeldii , 

 Salmo eperlanus, 



CUVIEB, Regne An. t. ii. p. 305. 

 WILLUGHBY, p. 202. 

 WILLUGHBY, tab. N. 6, fig. 4. 

 LINN&US. BLOCK, pt. i. pi. 28. 2. 

 PENN. Brit. Zool. vol. iii. p. 416, pi. 72. 

 DON. Brit. Fish. pi. 48. 



Generic Characters. Body elongated, covered with small scales : two dorsal 

 fins, the first with rays, the second fleshy, without rays ; ventral fins in a vertical 

 line under the commencement of the first dorsal fin : teeth on the jaws and 

 tongue very long, two distinct rows on each palatine bone, none on the vomer 

 except at the most anterior part ; branchiostegous rays 8. 



THE SMELT, as a British fish, appears to be almost ex- 

 clusively confined to the eastern and western coasts of Great 

 Britain. I am not aware of any good authority for the 

 appearance of the true Smelt between Dover and the Land's 

 End.* The fish called Smelt and Sandsmelt along the 



* Mr. Salter, in his Angler's Guide, page 169, says he has caught very fine 

 Smelts by angling in Portsmouth harbour ; but there is very little doubt that the 

 Sandsmelt, or Atherine, which is there abundant, is the fish alluded to. 



G % 



