14 NOTES ON FISH AND FISHING. 



well to give fish the credit of hearing, or something 

 equivalent to hearing, in some way or other, as well as 

 of seeing. Perhaps the discovery that the swimming 

 bladder is physically connected with the ears, or so-called 

 ears offish, may help towards the solution of this point. 



Cognate to those just alluded to is the further question, 

 whether fish are gifted to any considerable extent with 

 the senses of Smell and Taste. The anatomy of a fish 

 shows that the nerves of smell are comparatively large, 

 but several naturalists of mark argue that, from the struc- 

 ture of the nostril and the want of an aerial medium, fish 

 cannot smell at all, and that the nostrils perform a func- 

 tion similar to taste. Stoddart says of trout, that through 

 their power of smell they " discern their food at a singular 

 distance, and will track it, like the sleuth, for many yards." 

 So says an eminent French naturalist. Mr. Eonald, 

 above alluded to, made many experiments from his obser- 

 vatory to test the taste of trout, but confesses that the 

 subject is one of great difficulty. He used to blow them 

 various kinds of food through tubes, and the fact that 

 they took dead house-flies when plastered with cayenne 

 and mustard, seems more than any other to have led him 

 to conclude, that " if the animal had taste, his palate was 

 not peculiarly sensitive." Sir Humphry Davy, in his 

 Salmonia, says, " The principal use of the nostrils in 

 fishes, I believe, is to assist in the propulsion of water 

 through the gills, for performing the office of respiration ; 

 but I think there are some nerves in these organs which 

 give fishes a sense of the qualities of water, or of sub- 

 stances dissolved in or diffused through it, similar to our 

 sense of smell, or perhaps, rather, our sense of taste ; for 

 there can be no doubt that fishes are attracted by scented 



