260 THE HAG. 



within these, and also smaller ones upon the tongue ; 

 thus while it holds by the sucker, it can abrade 

 and lacerate the surface to which it sticks, so as to get 

 at and extract the nutritive part, even though the cover- 

 ing be tough and hard. The accounts that are generally 

 given about the lampreys fastening on cattle and horses 

 when they pass rivers, do not appear to be very well 

 authenticated. Neither is its food known with much 

 precision, though from the great simplicity of its di- 

 gestive apparatus, the food must be of a succulent 

 description when taken into the mouth, or else reduced 

 to one there. 



The PRIDE is smaller than the smallest lamprey, not 

 being above eight inches in length ; it is barred across 

 with a dusky colour. It contains fewer palatal teeth 

 than the lamprey. It is a mud fish, found in some of 

 the tributary streams of the Thames and some other 

 rivers, and has not been traced in migration, either to 

 or from the sea. 



The HAG is about the same length as the Pride ; 

 but its body is very glutinous, nearly a cylinder ; there 

 are no scales upon it, and it is without eyes. There 

 is a sucker round the mouth, one large piercing tooth 

 upon the palate, and a row of very close ones upon 

 each side of the tongue. The hag has sometimes 

 been confounded with the pride, but they are different 

 in their appearance and some parts of their struc- 

 ture, and also in their habitations ; the pride being 

 found only in rivers, and the hag in the sea. The hag 

 is a very voracious fish, and very annoying to the 



