134 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [anNO \6g6-7 . 



Dec. l6g6, two of them were found in the stomach of a common cod-fish, 

 sold in the fish-market at Dubhn. One of them, by lying long in the stomach, 

 was partly digested ; but the other was intire and unaltered. It was larger at 

 one end, and went tapering or gradually lessening towards the other. It was 

 4 inches, and -p^- of an inch long, and where largest it was an inch and -^ 

 broad; so that it was about 3 inches and -l. in circumference; at the smaller 

 end not above -^ of an inch broad. It had neither shell, crust, scales, or bone 

 for its covering, but was soft ; yet not flabby or fleshy, as the mollia described 

 by the naturalists, but rather membranous. The back, or upper side, was 

 roundish, especially towards the sides ; in the middle it was rather flattened, 

 the belly was perfectly plain ; along the middle of the back ran a large stripe 

 from one extremity to the other, about -i- of an inch broad, towards the upper 

 end, but still narrower as it came towards the tail. This stripe was all covered 

 with a short soft kind of down, not unlike, in texture, colour, and substance, 

 to that which grows on the back of the leaf of tussilago or colts'-foot. Join- 

 ing to the edge of this stripe, there ran, from one end to the other, a list about 

 ^ of an inch broad, that covered both sides of the animal, and part of his 

 back. This list or verge was thickly shagged, with a fine soft hair, that grew 

 very thick, and about a quarter of an inch long, of a most delicate changeable 

 red and green colour; and of so sparkling a vivid lustre, that nothing of this 

 kind could show more beautiful. Among this soft hair were thickly inter- 

 spersed, without order, an abundance of black, sharp, hard prickles, about the 

 same length as the hair, and the thickness of a hog's bristle, but much harder, 

 and very sharp at the points. The mouth was a very large patulous opening, 

 for the bulk of the animal ; not placed at the end, but somewhat underneath, 

 as forming part of the belly, and could not be seen when the back was turned 

 uppermost. 



After having well observed its outward shape, I opened it, but found here 

 little variety of parts ; that which first offered, was a thin membranous gullet, 

 that led from the mouth to the stomach, about an inch long: from this was 

 continued straight-downwards the stomach, not lying transverse, as is its most 

 usual posture, but lengthwise ; it was of a whitish colour, and of a tough thick 

 texture, consisting of an external and internal membrane, with a sort of carneous 

 substance between, resembling somewhat in make, though not in figure, the 

 gizzard in some fowl ; it was as large as the upper jpint of a man's little finger; 

 to this was annexed the intestine, of a very different colour and substance from 

 the stotnach, being reddish, soft, and tender, and of a much smaller cavity ; 

 it was continued almost directly, or with little circumvolution, to the anus; 



