SCOMBERIDJi;. 213 



ancient name of coryphsena, used to be caught* on hooks 

 attached to a clumsy dolphin-shaped dump of lead, dub- 

 bed with feathers, is still to this very day secured by the 

 same unartistic cheat, which, to his hazy vision, seems a 

 flying fish. Thersites, another of the tribe, is taken, off 

 the Cape, with long dangling strips of leather, fastened 

 round a central weight, in rude imitation of a loligo, or 

 cuttle; the thunny, again, is inveigled off Bayonne by 

 means of a hook baited with a white dimity sardine, the 

 barbs left bare, and the shank rendered attractive by a 

 wrap of blue cloth; while, to mention but one more 

 member of this short-sighted family, the mackerel, the 

 subject of our present notice, is lured to its fate by the 

 gaudy temptation of a piece of blue cloth, trailed along 

 the surface of the water. Oppian, who seems to have 

 been aware of the mackerel's weakness for flaming co- 

 lours, and of the mishaps this is wont to entail, compares 

 the rashness of its conduct to that of an infant coquet- 

 ting with fire : — 



Just so the little smiling boy admires 

 The candle's painted blaze and curling spires ; 

 Extends his hand, but dear experience gains, 

 The greatest beauty gives the greatest pains.f 



But there is another mightier engine of destruction 

 than hooks, to which few other fish seem wholly insen- 

 sible. 'In vain,' we know, 'is the net spread in the 

 sight of any bird ;' and though fish may not cope with 

 birds in cerebral development, yet few of the finny tribe 

 appear to view the meshy machinations of the fishermen 

 with absolute iudifference, or without betraying some 

 symptoms of distrust. The mackerel alone shows no 

 such timidity; the very neighbourhood of a decoy has 

 charms for his iaexperience, and it is the area accord- 



* Oppian. t lb., S. J. t. 



