FOUND IN NORFOLK. 37 



doggefishes'^ great and small wch pursue the shoale of 

 herrings and other fish butt this yeare 1662 one was 

 aken intangled in the Herring netts about 9 foot in 

 length, answering the last figure of Johnstonus lib 7 

 vnder the name of canis carcherias alter & was by the 

 teeth & 5 gills one kind of shark particularly \_Fol. 25] 

 remarkable in the vastnesse of the optick nerves & 3 

 conicall hard pillars wch supported the extraordinarie 

 elevated nose wch wee haue reserued with the scull the 

 seamen calld this kind a scrape. 



Sturio or Sturgeon" so comon on the other side of the 

 sea about the mouth of the elbe come seldome into our 

 creekes though some haue been taken at yarmouth & 

 more in the great [owse crossed out] Owse by Lynne 

 butt their heads not so sharpe as represented in the 

 Icons of Rondeletius & Johnstonus. 



'•^ Various species of Dog-fish are frequent off the Norfolk coast as else- 

 where. The name "Sweet William" is applied to the larger fish of this 

 kind, especially to the Tope ; this appears also to have been the case in 

 Pennant's time, for alluding to this vernacular name he supposes it was 

 applied in ironical allusion to the offensive smell of their flesh and skin. 

 They are objects of great aversion among the fishermen, owing to the disturb- 

 ance they create among the shoals of fish, and the damage they do to both nets 

 and the enclosed fish. Scarcely a season passes but one or more specimens 

 of Browne's Cams carcharias, or, as modern Ichthyologists call it, Lamna 

 cornubica, the Porbeagle, being entangled in the drift nets and landed with 

 the herrings. One lies on the fish-wharf at Lowestoft as I write this note 

 on the 19th of October, 1900, measuring 7 feet 10 inches in length. 

 Jonston's figure referred to by Browne is evidently intended for this 

 species, but he makes a slight error in the reference to the Historia 

 Naluralis (De Piscibus et Cetis) ; it occurs in book v., and the figure is 

 fig. 6 on Tab. vi., and it is marked Canis carcharias alius (not alter). 



" So great is the variation in the snout of the Sturgeon, that Dr. 

 Parnell in his excellent essay on " The Fishes of the District of the Forth," 

 describes the Sharp-nosed Sturgeon as a distinct species under the name of 

 Acipenser sturio, and the broad-nosed form he calls A, latirostris. His 

 views, however, have not been generally accepted, and only one British 

 species is recognised. The Sharp-nosed variety has been taken here, but 

 the normal form is much more frequent. 



