The Chief Food Fish 275 



At any rate, I have ventured to put the Cod first, 

 and firmly believe that I am justified in so doing. 



To the Cod family belong also the Haddock, the 

 Whiting, the Ling, the Pollock, and the Rocklings, 

 aU valuable food fishes, but especially the Haddock, 

 which, in its smoked form, runs the smoked herring 

 very closely in its hold on popular favour in our own 

 country. Naturalists also include the Hake, and 

 I suppose they are right, although for my part I fail 

 to see an5rthing about a Hake which can give him a 

 claim to any relationship with the Cod, and therefore 

 shall refuse to say anything about him here. 



The principal and most valuable characteristic 

 of the Cod is its amazing fecimdity. It has been 

 calculated that a single fish wiU deposit nine millions of 

 eggs, a number which in its vastness simply bewilders 

 us, for we cannot at all realise what such a mighty 

 host means. Yet so numerous are the natural checks 

 placed upon the too rapid increase of the Cod, that 

 there are never too many for the seas they frequent 

 to contain and provide for ; in fact, it is safe to guess 

 that out of those nine millions of eggs probably not 

 more than as many tens attain to maturity. Around 

 the British coasts are favourite breeding grounds 

 of the Cod, where in comparatively shallow waters 

 he runs the gauntlet of his coimtless foes, escaping 

 in such numbers as to make the Cod-fishery a lucrative 

 form of the fishing industry. 



But nearly all Cod and codlings caught on our 

 coasts come to market to be sold fresh, except in Passion 

 Week, when every fishmonger's shop becomes suddenly 

 full of wet salted Cod temptingly folded inside out 

 and garnished with lemons. The Cod lends itself 

 amicably also to keeping fresh on ice, although it 

 must be admitted that between Cod freshly caught 



