56 NOTES ON FISHES FOUND IN NORFOLK. 



The Gryllotalpa or fencricket comon in fenny places 

 butt wee haue met with them also in dry places dung- 

 hills & church yards of this citty. 



Beside horseleaches & periwinkles in plashes & 

 standing waters we haue met with vermes setacei or 

 hardwormes butt could neuer conuert horsehayres into 

 them by laying them in water as also the \^Fol. 38] the 

 {bis) great Hydrocantharus or black shining water 

 Beetle the forficula, sqilla, corculum and notonecton that 

 swimmeth on its back. 



Camden [smear] reports that in former time there 

 haue been [otters crossed ou{\ Beuers in the Riuer of 

 Cardigan in wales, this wee are to sure of that the 

 Riuers great Broads & carres afford great store of otters 

 with us, a [des crossed oui\ great destroyer of fish as 

 feeding butt from ye vent downewards. [a prey crossed 

 out] not free from being a prey it self for their yong 

 ones haue been found in Buzzards nests, they are 

 accounted no bad dish by many are to bee made very 

 tame and in some howses haue [semed crossed out] 

 serued for turnespitts, 



[Blank space.] 



Note. — Although Browne's account of the Fishes is doubtless 

 derived from his personal observation, I have found it very diffi- 

 cult in some families, such as the Cods, Rays, Gurnards, Flat- 

 fishes, and Gobies to identify them with the species as at present 

 known ; in fact, they were at that time very imperfectly differ- 

 entiated, and the figures in the old authors are generally so inexact 

 as not to be recognisable. Ray, in 1674 (" English Words not 

 generally known," p. loi), thus writes of the sea fishes, " several 

 of them, we judge, not yet described by any Author extant in 

 print : indeed the writers of Natural History of Animals living far 

 from the Ocean, and so having never had opportunity of seeing 

 these kind of fishes .... write very confusedly and obscurely 

 concerning them," a remark which I have found abundantly 

 verified. 



