TURBOT. 131 



get free. The fresh-water lamprey is also a 

 favourite bait, vast quantities being used by the 

 Dutch, principally on account of the ease with 

 which they can be kept alive on board the boats 

 at sea and their silvery colour. 



The turbot generally feeds on small fish, crus- 

 tacea, and mollusca. They spawn in August and 

 rapidly recover their condition and firmness. 

 Turbot have been taken seventy pounds weight 

 each ; recently the number of turbot brought to 

 the Billingsgate market was 90,000 in one year, 

 and the sauce from them caused the consumption 

 of 2,000,000 lobsters. 



The fisheries on the Varne and the Ridge, two 

 sandbanks off Dover, commence in the spring 

 with both line and trawl-net. The Varne lies 

 east-north-east and west-south-west, about six 

 miles in length, and one and a quarter mile in 

 breadth, having two and a half fathoms of water 

 on its shoalest part, with thirteen fathoms close 

 to it. 



The Ridge lies nearly north-east by east, and 

 south-west by west, nine miles in length, and two 

 miles in breadth, at the back of the Varne, and 

 has on it from nine feet to four fathoms ; this 



