OF FISHES IN GENERAL.' 3I 



midft: that fecurity which they enjoy, and the eafe with 

 which they can repel the hoftility of the inimical tribes, 

 they run but little hazard of being deftroyed by their ra- 

 pacity. 



Section V. 



Of the Growth f Longevity, and Dietical Ufes ofFiJh. 



As the dangers to which the progeny of all the fpinous 

 fifhes, while in the form of ova, and in their nafcent 

 flate, are innumerable, and furrounding them on every 

 fide, Nature has happily ordered, that they Ihould re- 

 main but a fliort time in that defencelefs condition. The 

 period at which the different fpecies arrive at their ap- 

 pointed liz,e, is not exactly afcertained ; but the genera- 

 lity of naturaliils agree in reckoning it extremely fhort *. 

 Ariftotle, and Pliny who copied him, feem both to have 

 committed a miftake, when they affigned only two years 

 for the life of the tunny f , a fiih which approaches to 

 to the fize of a whale. This fpecies had various differ- 

 ent names affigned it, till it arrived at its fifth year, wheo 

 it received the appellation of a whale ; a circumflance from 

 which we mufl conclude, that the ancients in general en- 

 tertained a very different idea of its longevity %. Of a 



fimilar 



* Rondeletius, de pifcibus. 



f Vita Thynnis longiffima biennio. Plinii Hift. Anim. 

 I During the firft year, they were called Scordyla; the fecond, Palami • 

 sjesi the third, Thynni?; the fourth, Orcyni; and the fifth, Cete. 



