VOt. LXIII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 411 



Animalium Auslriae, p. 383, is the only writer who takes notice of this species; 

 he calls it acipenser rostro acuto, corpore tuberculis spinosis aspero: the inhabi- 

 tants of Austria call it shirk, a name they have no doubt borrowed from the 

 Slavonian name sevruga. The famous painter and traveller Cornelys de Bruyn 

 mentions this kind of fish, but in so superficial a manner, that one plainly sees 

 he was little, if at all, used to discussions in points of natural history. Had de 

 Bruyn examined the sevruga, he would certainly have found it materially 

 different from the stoer or assetrina, i. e. the common blunt nosed sturgeon of 

 Germany and the Baltic. Mr. F. supposes the English sturgeon, from Pejinant's 

 description, and the drawing in the British Zoology, illustrated by plates, 

 tab. 89, to be the same with this kind from Hudson's Bay, and with the sevruga 

 of the Russians, and the shirk of the Austrians, The true sturgeon, which 

 gave the name to the whole genus,* he thinks an unknown fish in England. 

 The species of sturgeons are more numerous than one is at first aware of; and 

 it would therefore be of some utility, that persons, who have an opportunity of 

 examining all the various kinds at Vienna, and in Russia, might do it with more 

 care than has hitherto been done. Mr. Klein, a very ingenious naturalist, has 

 enumerated 10 sturgeons, in his 4th Missus Piscium, p. 11 — 16; and Count 

 Marsigli, in his splendid work about the Danube, torn. 4, gives the names of 

 at least 6 sturgeons, but the characters are not sufficiently settled in both these 

 works. Klein saw only 2 kinds of sturgeons, and a 3d in spirits; and Count 

 Marsigli was not enough of a naturalist to give adequate descriptions of these 

 fish. 



The 2d of the Hudson's Bay fish, is called, by the wild natives of that 

 country, marthy, and is no other than our common burbot, gadus Iota, Linn, 

 only vastly superior in size. The descriptions given of this fish, in the British 

 Zoology, is entirely corresponding with this specimen, so that it would be super- 

 fluous to presume to make any additions to it. However, after a most minute 

 examination, Mr. F. could find no more than 6 branchiostegous rays in the two 

 specimens from Hudson's Bay, of which Mr. Pennant mentions 7 in the English 

 burbot, and Artedi as many in his specimens. This great naturalist seems 

 likewise to be right, when he observes that the cirrhi, or beards on the end of the 

 nose, are the valves to one of the nostrils; for Mr. F. found that these beards, on 

 their under side, opened into a hole corresponding with the lower nostril. Mr. A. 

 Graham, the collector of the natural history specimens at Severn river in 

 Hudson's Bay, observes, that these fish constantly swim close to the ground, 

 and are extremely voracious; for he represents them as not content with 



* The Gennans call tliis fish stoer, from the old Teutonic word stor or stuhr, which signifies great, 

 as this fish grows to a very large size Thus likewise the Scotch call the tunny, mackrel store. Vide 

 Mr. Pennants Tour in Scotland, p. 1 92. — Orig. 



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