134 CLUPEID^. 



water with their tails : they appear to disencumber them- 

 selves of the matured roe by violent muscular action ; and 

 on a calm still evening or night the noise they make may be 

 heard at some distance. I have obtained the young only 

 two inches and a half long in October ; and suspect they 

 grow slowly, finding them only four inches long, and the 

 young of the larger Allice Shad only six inches long, in the 

 following spring. 



The habits and habitat of the two species of Shads have 

 probably been very frequently confounded. Though both 

 are common in the Severn during a particular season, Mon- 

 tagu has not noticed the appearance of either on the coast of 

 Devon. One species has been noticed on the Cornish coast 

 by Mr. Couch, and has also been taken near Dublin. On 

 the eastern coast it is common in the Thames ; is occasionally 

 taken off Yarmouth, on the Norfolk coast, with the Her- 

 rings, and also in the Tyne. It appears to have a consider- 

 able range to the northward, both Professors Nilsson and 

 Reinhardt including it among the fishes of Scandinavia. 

 The food of the Shads is small fish and the softer-skinned 

 Crustacea. 



The length of the head compared to the whole length 

 of the fish is as one to five ; the depth of the body rather 

 greater than the length of the head ; the distance from the 

 point of the nose to the commencement of the dorsal fin, mea- 

 sured again from thence backwards, falls far short of the end 

 of the fleshy portion of the tail ; the base of the last dorsal fin- 

 ray is half-way between the point of the nose and the end of 

 the caudal rays ; the longest ray of the dorsal fin is as long as 

 the base of the fin ; the ventral fins, without axillary scales, 

 are placed a little behind the line of the commencement of 

 the dorsal fin ; the base of the anal fin, occupying about 

 two-fifths of the space between the ventral fin and the end 



