230 AEISTOTLE'S ENAIMA, 



or, as Aristotle explains more correctly, ovoviviparous.* 

 He also says that they have fat livers from which oil 

 is extracted,! and that they have no scales, but that some 

 are rough.! 



Pliny says that Aristotle was the first to give the name 

 Selache to fishes of this kind.§ 



Among Aristotle's SelacJie the following are included : — 



The inclusion of Batrachos, the fishing-frog, is one of 

 the chief defects in his work on cartilaginous fishes. 

 Again, his assertion that all his Selache, except Batrachos, 

 are viviparous, || is incorrect, for some are oviparous, e. g., 

 the true dog-fishes and rays. In other respects, however, 

 his description of the Selache applies very fairly to those 

 cartilaginous fishes with which he was acquainted. 



The Batos, Aristotle says, is of flat form,1I has a rough 

 tail and body,** and buries itself in the sand, to facilitate 

 capture of its prey, ft He also speaks of Batis, especially in 

 H. A. vi. 0. 10, s. 4, where he mentions its eggs and their 

 hair-like filaments. These are the clearest statements 

 made by Aristotle about Batos and Batis, which are 

 probably the male and female respectively of the thornback 

 skate {Baia clavata). The modern Greek name for a skate 

 is Bati. 



Besides describing its peculiar gill coverings, already 

 discussed in Chapter xi., Aristotle says that the Batrachos 

 has a spiny head, very rough, and many times larger than 

 the rest of its body, t + and that its tail and adjacent parts 

 of its body are more fleshy to compensate for the small 

 amount of flesh in the front part of its body.§§ He also 

 describes, in unmistakable language, its lures and fishing 

 habits. |] II 



The fishing-frog {L ophites piscatoritts), the Batrachos of 



* H. A. vi. c. 10, s. 1 ; P. A. iv. c, 1, 6766 ; G. A. lii. c. 1, 749a. 



f H. A. iii. c. 13, s. 2. I P. A. iv. c. 13, 697a. 



^ Nat. Hist. ix. 40. || H. A. v. c. 9, s. 6. 



IT H. A. V, c. 4, s. 1. 

 *- H. A. vi. c. 10, s. 7 ; P. A. iv. c. 13, 697a. 



ft H. A. ix. c. 25, s. 3. +! Gf. A. iii. c. 3, 754a. 



§§ P. A. iv. c. 13, 6956. |||| E. A. ix. c. 25, s. 1. 



