62 NEW SOUTH WALES 
‘They are caught very often with a line in April, in about three fathoms 
water in the harbour. The bait used is a small silvery piece of the side 
of a fish. : . ‘ 
I have caught the dory at several places with the line and hook, and the 
moment it was dropped into the boat the mouth was pushed out to an enormous 
degree, as if indignant at the treatment it received. Singular to observe, I caught 
with the net a dory in Botany Bay at the time we were trawling for turbot. The 
dory has been long known, and when the currency of the Colony was in Mexican 
coin it was called a ‘dollar fish,” and was esteemed a fine fish either as fried or 
boiled ; but it isa rare fish, and may be considered a good one, though not from 
that cause. 
I don’t know how to describe the dory of the Colony; it is not a migratory 
fish, as we hear of it only now and then. It must be here, as Mr. Couch calls it 
elsewhere, a wanderer, following the fry of other fishes, on which, together with 
shrimps, it lives. The John Dory is known by name as well as any fish in the 
Colony from the scriptural allusion, and is easily identified from its peculiar mark 
on either side ; that of this Colony bears all the characteristics, and those which I 
have handled weigh about 4 to 5 lbs,—E. Hrnu, 
The Dory is of too greedy a temperament to like the short commons imposed 
upon those overgrown communities called shoals ; he lives therefore very much to 
himself, frequenting such rocky sites as afford a safe retreat and an abundant 
supply of small fish.—Badham’s Ancient and Modern Fish Tattle. 
The families StrromaTeip#, CoryPH=NID# (Dolphins), and Nomzipz 
need not delay us, as they are of no economic value to Australia. 
VII.—Fam. SCOMBRIDA. 
Body oblong, scarcely compressed, naked, or with small scales, eye 
lateral, dentition well developed. No bony stay for the operculum 
Two dorsal fins with (generally) finlets besides. Ventrals thoracic, with 
one spine and five rays. More than ten abdominal and more than 
fourteen caudal vertebree. 
This is the Mackerel family composed of ocean fishes of prey found 
in all temperate and tropical latitudes. They form, says Giinther, one of 
four families of fishes most useful to man, the others being the Herring, 
the Cod, and the Salmon families. Their muscles receive a greater 
number of blood-vessels and nerves than other fishes, and are of a colour 
more like those of birds and mammals, and the temperature of the blood 
is warmer than other fishes by several degrees. Seven species are known 
of the genus Scomber, of which each coast seems to have its peculiar 
variety. It is distinguished by the feeble spines of the dorsal and the 
rows of little finlets behind the dorsal and anal, scales very small, and 
equally covering the whole body. Teeth small. Two short ridges on 
each side of the caudal fin. 
, The Mackerel.* 
With reference to our species, Scomber antarcticus, of Castelnau, Prof. 
M‘Coy says that he cannot on comparison find the slightest difference 
between the Hobson’s Bay and Mediterranean specimens. This would 
make our species S. pneumatophorus, De la Roche. It occurs rarely in 
Hobson’s Bay, and generally in the month of June, and then in con- 
siderable numbers. 
*An excellent figure of this fish, which is extremely like the European 
Mackerel, will be found in Prof. M‘Coy’s Prodrom. Zool. Vict., plate 28. 
