90 MARKETABLE BRITISH MARINE FISHES chap. 



mark ; those of the sea-snails or diminutive suckers {Liparis) 

 form rounded masses not much larger than a marble, which are 

 attached to the forks of branching zoophytes, very frequently to 

 a species which is common on the east coast and called 

 Hydrallniannia. This spawn has been frequently mistaken both 

 by fishermen and naturalists for the spawn of the herring, 

 especially in former years before the characters of the eggs of 

 different fishes had been thoroughly investigated. The indi- 

 vidual ^g^, however, is a little smaller than that of the herring, 

 and, as seen in Fig. 40, has an altogether different character. The 

 yolk contains several oil-globules. The still smaller sucker fishes, 



Fig. 41. — Egg of the Double-spotted Sucker {Lepadogaster). 



called Lepadogaster, deposit their eggs, which are oval and 

 somewhat flattened, on the inner surface of empty shells. Fig. 41 

 shows the Q:^% of one of these, the double-spotted sucker. The 

 eggs of the gobies are peculiar, having a long, spindle-like form, 

 one end of which is attached to a smooth surface by means of 

 fibres which project all round it and form a network, somewhat 

 like rootlets (Fig. 42). 



Eggs which are free and carried about at the mercy of tides 

 and currents cannot receive any care or protection from the 

 parent fish, but marked parental solicitude and exertion are ex- 

 hibited by many of the commercially useless fishes which pro- 

 duce attached eggs. As a rule it is the male parent which in 



