366 AMERICAN FISHES. 
‘¢ Bluefish Mummichog.’’ On various parts of the coast they have special 
names, which, however, do not appear to refer to special peculiarities. 
About Cape Hatteras the names ‘‘ Jumping Mullet’’ and “Sand Mullet” 
occur ; in Northampton County, Va., “¢ Fat-back,”’ and in Southeastern 
Florida ‘‘Silver Mullet’? and ‘‘ Big-eyed Mullet.’”? The name “ Fat- 
back ’’ is also in use, but whether this name is used for Mullets in general, 
or simply for those in particularly good condition, I have been unable to 
learn. In the Gulf of Mexico the Striped Mullet is known simply as the 
«¢ Mullet’’; the other species as the ‘‘ Silver Mullet.”’ 
There are seventy or more species of Mullets, some of which are 
found on every stretch of coast line in the world in the temperate and 
tropical zones. They live in the sea, and in the brackish waters near the 
mouths of rivers. They, like the menhaden, though indeed to a still 
greater degree, subsist on the organic substances which are mingled with 
the mud and sand on the bottom. 
In order to prevent the larger bodies from passing into the stomach, or 
substances from passing through the gill openings, they have the organs of 
the pharynx modified into a filtering apparatus. They take in a quantity 
of sand and mud, and, after having worked it for some time between the 
pharyngeal bones, they eject the roughest and most indigestible portion of 
it. Each branchial arch is provided on each side, in its whole length, 
with a series of closely set gill-rakers, which are laterally bent downward, 
each series closely fitting into the series of the adjoining arch; these con- 
stitute together a sieve, admirably adapted to permit a transit for the 
water, retaining, at the same time, every other substance in the cavity of 
the pharynx. The intestinal tract is no less peculiar, and the stomach, 
like that of the menhaden, resembles the gizzard of a bird. The intestines 
make a great number of circumvolutions, and are seven feet long in a 
specimen thirteen inches in length. 
Although Mullets are abundant almost everywhere, it is probable that no 
stretches of sea-coast in the world are so bountifully supplied with them 
as those of our own Southern Atlantic and Gulf States, with their broad 
margin of partially or entirely land-locked brackish water and the numerous 
estuaries and broad river mouths. The mullet is probably the most 
generally popular and the most abundant fish of our own whole southern 
seaboard. Like the menhaden, it utilizes food inaccessible to other fishes, 
groping in the bottom mud, which it swallows in large quantities. Like 
