pennant's opinion. 21 



argument must likewise hold good against the whitebait being 

 the young of the herring ; yet it is remarkable that the number 

 of vertebrae of both fisheS, i.e. the common herring and a portion 

 of the whitebait, are the same, namely, fifty-six, as are also the 

 formulae of the various fin-rays. But little weight need be laid 

 on this latter point; few writers give the same figures about the 

 fin-rays ; and as there are different kinds of herrings, and dif- 

 ferent races of each kind, it is probable that there will be 

 differences in the number of fin-rays. What is harder to under- 

 stand is the fact that the vertebrae differ also ; these run from 

 forty-seven in the sprat to fifty-six in the common herring, different 

 numbers having been found in the same race of herring. But whilst 

 it may be admitted, for the sake of argument, that the smaller 

 number might increase — i.e. that sprats with forty-eight vertebrae 

 might grow into herring with fifty-six vertebrae — it is quite clear 

 that whitebait with fifty-sis vertebrae wiU never grow into sprats 

 with forty-eight vertebrae ! The more the case of the whitebait 

 is studied, the more difficult it becomes to arrive at a satisfactory 

 conclusion. The earliest writer on whitebait that we know is 

 Pennant ; but when he wrote the whitebait was not a fashion- 

 able fish. It was eaten then only by. "common people" — 

 " the lower order of epicures " — and the authorities, thinking 

 that whitebait were the young or fry of some large fish, " pro- 

 claimed " that it should not be taken. Pennant at one time 

 held the whitebait to be the young of the bleak, and Dr. 

 Shaw followed suit in his General Zoology; while Donovan 

 held " that same " to be the young of the shad. Donovan, 

 blundering himself, "pitches into" Pennant for his errors, 

 maintaining that the industrious zoologist had never seen the 

 real whitebait. This latter idea is worth following up. Might 

 not our savans, now that the mysterious dish has taken its place 

 on the rich man's table, summon a congress to sit upon it? 

 Were a general fishery congress to be held, it would be well 

 that specimens of the whitebait of different rivers should be ex- 

 hibited and reported upon ; for the fish known as whitebait at 

 Blackwall may not be the fish known as whitebait at Queens- 

 ferry. In the case of the parr controversy, it was found that 

 there were parrs of many different members of the salmon 

 family, which, as a matter of course, greatly enhanced the diffi- 

 culty of solution, as well as setting the experimenters by the 

 ears. The whitebait mystery is one of those mysteries which 

 many a dabbler in natural history wiU hold himself able to 



