CHAPTER VI. 



MISCELLANEOUS PISHES. 



MENHADEN, BONY-FISH (HARD-HEADS OR MOSS- 

 BUNKERS), 



Clupea Menhaden (Mitchill). 



ECESSARY mention is made of this fish as a bait 

 for the angler. He seems to have been created 

 as food for other members of the aquatic family, 

 or as a fertilizer of the barren sands of Long 

 Island. No figures have ever been made large 

 enough to estimate their immense numbers. This bony in- 

 habitant of the sea is not counted, but measured, by the load or 

 by the acre. Seines, miles in length, hauled by machinery, are 

 used in his capture, and many tons of them are taken in each 

 net that is hauled on old " Long Island's sea-girt shore." Dr. 

 Mitchill, in his work on fishes, says : " I have seen acres of 

 thetn ; and the whalemen say that the great bone-whale 

 (Bnlama mysticetus) has been seen with his great mouth open 

 gulping down some hogsheads of them at a single gulp ! 

 n hat a gulp ! probably a trifling appetizer before dining on 

 some of the larger species that sport in his little pond ! " 



The New York Evening Post some years since, in speak- 

 ing of a haul of this fish, says : " This is no fish-story ; we 

 have seen an acre or two of these fish, a foot or two in length, 

 and a constant procession of emts taking the m bark into the 



