COALFISH. 169 



SUBBRACHIAL 



MALACOPTERYGII. GADIDJE. 



THE COALFISH. 



Merlangus carbonarius, CUVIER, Regne An. t. ii. p. 332. 



,, Coalfish, FIEM. Brit. An. p. 195, sp. 93. 



,, ,, Cotefish, WILLUGHBY, p. 168, L. 3. 



Gudus ,, LINN^US. BLOCK, pt. ii. pi. 66. 



>, ,, Coalfish, PENN. Brit. Zool. vol. iii. p. 250. 



,, DON. Brit. Fish. pi. 13. 



THE COALFISH is most decidedly a northern fish, but, 

 being a hardy species, is not without considerable range 

 to the southward. It was the only fish found by Lord 

 Mulgrave on the shores of Spitzbergen ; and the fry, only 

 four or five inches in length, were caught with the trawl- 

 net on the west coast of Davis's Straits, during the first 

 voyage of Captain Sir Edward Parry. It abounds in all 

 the northern seas and in the Baltic, and may be said to 

 swarm in the Orkneys, where the fry all the months of 

 summer and autumn are the great support of the poor. 

 Dr. Neill, in his tour of the islands of Orkney and Shetland, 

 saw an old man, and perhaps one or two boys, seated 

 upon almost every projecting rock, holding in each hand a 

 wand or fishing-rod, and catching young Coalfish as fast as 

 they could bait their hooks. 



VOL. II. N 



