yt XATURAL HISTORY. 



British coast, and along the shores of Europe, and ranges southward in the Atlantic to the Cape of Good 

 Hope. On the head of this voracious animal are two or three detached rays of the dorsal fin, which are 

 extended as long filaments and terminate upward in bright shining surfaces. Keeping close to the 

 bottom, the fish is said to stir up the mud by moving its ventral and pectoral fins, and at the 

 same time elevates these appendages : then, as small fishes approach to examine the bait, they 

 are immediately seized by the Angler. It has been known to seize Codfish and Conger Eels after 

 those fishes had taken the fisherman's hook. Couch records that nearly three-quarters of a 

 hundred of Herrings have been taken from the stomach of a single Angler, in a condition fit for 

 market, and that another individual similarly yielded up twenty-one Flounders and a Dory, which 

 also found their way to market ; so that the digestion of the fish is apparently very slow. On one 

 occasion some boys thrust a board into the mouth of a large Angler, which was seen in shallow 



VMALTHE VEJSPEKTILIO. 



water, and the fish allowed itself to be drawn into their boat without releasing its hold. One Angler 

 lias been seen endeavouring to swallow a Gull, and another had seized a Great Northern Diver 

 (Colynibus glacialis) ; but its appetite is so little discriminative that it has swallowed the cork buoys 

 of a crab-pot, the floating barrel fixed to the head-rope of a pilchard-net, and the iron grapnel of a 

 fisherman's boat. This fish reaches a length of about five feet. The roe, which is small, is computed 

 to contain about a million and a half of eggs ; but the young fish are so rare as to be almost unknown, 

 The gape of the mouth is extremely wide ; the teeth are arranged in alternate series, and are con- 

 stantly renewed from behind. The aperture for the gills is a small foramen placed just behind the 

 pectoral fin. 



Dr. Guiither remarks that the species of the genus Antennarius, which inhabit the seas: 

 between the Tropics and feed on floating seaweed, are enabled to fill the large stomach with air so as. 

 to sustain themselves on the surface of the water, and thus become driven by currents over wide 

 regions of the ocean. The genus Malthe has the nasal bones prolonged over the forehead into a 

 prominent process, below which is a tentacle capable of being retracted into a cavity. The skin has a 

 rough aspect from being covered with conical protubei-ances. The snout in Mnlt/te vespertilio, which 

 inhabits the Atlantic coast of America, varies in length, being sometimes as little as one twenty- 

 fifth of the total length of the fish, and sometimes as much as one-sixth of the length in Brazilian 



