122 CLUPEID.E. 



mense quantities and at a very moderate price immediately 

 after the Herring season is over, it supplies during all the 

 winter months of the year a cheap and agreeable food. 

 Immense quantities are eaten ; and from their rich quality 

 and flavour, the consumption is not solely confined to the 

 lower classes. They are generally eaten fresh, but are also 

 preserved in various ways. 



The Sprat is included by Linnseus in his Fauna Suecica, 

 and by Professors Nilsson and Reinhardt in their publica- 

 tions on the Fishes of Scandinavia. Dr. Neill says the 

 Sprat is sold in Edinburgh market by the dozen ; and I 

 have received specimens that were taken near the Forth, 

 where they are called Garvie Herrings and Garvies. Far- 

 ther south, they are most plentiful on the Norfolk, Suffolk, 

 Essex, and Kentish coasts. I have taken them on the 

 Dorsetshire coast in June, and they were then in roe. They 

 inhabit the deep water round our southern coast during the 

 summer months, and may be found in the stomachs of 

 many of our voracious fishes every month in the year. 

 I have taken three Sprats from the stomach of a Whiting, 

 and have caught young Sprats off Ramsgate, Hastings, and 

 Weymouth, in the months of August and September. Like 

 the other species of the genus Clupea^ they are wanderers : 

 the shoals are capricious in their movements, and exceed- 

 ingly variable in their numbers. " Upwards of a ton weight 

 of Sprats was sold in our market last Saturday." (Taunton 

 Courier, January 1832.) "It is nearly fifty years since this 

 useful fish visited the neighbouring coast, and they now 

 appear in exhaustless shoals close in shore on the south 

 coast of Devon."" 



The Sprat is occasionally taken in Cornwall ; and in Ire- 

 land, on the coasts of Cork, Dublin, and Belfast. 



In Cornwall the true Sprat is, however, very rare ; and 



