SCOMBERIDiE. 229 



sometimes stands^ without a prefix^ may be a dipt form 

 of adore; and as it was formerly consecrated to Jupiter, 

 and is still held sacred by the Chinese, this derivation 

 has a sort of traditional plausibility in its favour. Other 

 etymologists, however, go further than France, and con- 

 ceive John Dory to be a barbarous dismemberment and 

 Anglican corruption of janitore, a name by which this 

 fish is familiarly known at Venice and elsewhere ; the 

 origin of the tevm Janitore, as applied to the dory, seems 

 to be the following : St. Peter, represented with the triple 

 keys ' of hell, of hades, and of heaven' in his hand, is 

 called, in his quasi-official capacity, il janitore, and this 

 fish, sharing with the haddock the apocryphal honour 

 of having received the apostle's thumb-mark (which has 

 been ever since as indelibly branded on its posterity as 

 the blood upon Bluebeard's key), is called in conse- 

 quence St. Peter's fish,* and by metonymy, il Janitore. 

 The ancient Greek name for the dory, as we learn from 

 Columella, was Zeus, Jupiter; and it may be that the 

 Roman Church, fond ever of transferring the thunderer's 

 honours to their patron saint (witness how his pagan 

 toe has been worn away by fervent lips doing homage in 

 their hearts to Cephas) , has canonized this fish to remove 

 all conscientious scruples, and to render it as safe, as it is 

 a savoury diet, for the fasts of the faithful. The Latin 

 word for dory is faber; it was supposed to be so desig- 

 nated in consequence of the miniature resemblance of 

 many of the bones of the head to the tools used in a 

 smithy ; Gesner says it still passes by this name in Dal- 



* St. Peter, as mucli the patron saint of British fishermen 

 and fishmongers as of Eoman Pontiffs, perpetuates to this day his 

 name and insignia amongst us, in the Peter-boats which still ply 

 the Thames, and in the display of the cross keys (the instru- 

 ments of his authority) which form a part of the armorial bear- 

 ings of the Fishmongers' Company of London. 



