The Sea Lamprey. 



415 



are brought forward so as to be able to act on it by a circular 

 motion ; and a limited space of the captive prey is thus rasped 

 into a pulp and swallowed, until a hole is made which may 

 perhaps penetrate to the bones, and from the torture of which 

 the most strenuous exertion of the victim cannot deliver it. 

 The most active fishes are subject to this infliction, and on none 

 have I found it more frequent than on the mackerel, although 

 the gurnard, coal-fish [Banning Pollack), cod, and haddock, 

 have been also the subjects of attack. It might be supposed 

 that death would be the inevitable fate of fishes which have 

 been thus dealt with ; but I have seen some that have borne 

 the mark of having been thus fed on, which after having perhaps 

 satisfied the appetite of their foe have survived to have the 

 wound healed, although not without an enduring mark. In 

 repeated instances a lamprey which did not exceed six or 

 seven inches in length has been caught 

 "while still adhering firmly to the body 

 of a mackerel; a circumstance which 

 happens most frequently in the spring of 

 the year. It is in the spring, and with 

 us about April and May, that the lam- 

 prey is ready to deposit its spawn, for 

 which purpose it seeks the fresh water 

 of the deepest of our rivers. I have had 

 it brought to me from the sea with the roe 

 enlarged on the 1 1th of April, and also 

 in the middle of May ; but in Holland, 

 Huysch says it is so early as February, 

 and in Scotland Sir William Jardine as- 

 signs it to June, and thenceforward 

 so late as to the end of August. It is at this its first entry 

 into the rivers that the fishery is entered upon for taking it. 

 The Severn has long been celebrated for this fishery, and 

 for the excellency of the lampreys taken in it. Indeed, it is 

 not known that this fish is much sought after in any other river; 

 and even there so fluctuating is the taste of epicurism, that 

 within a few years the sale of it has much declined. They are 

 fished for mostly in the night, and from thirty to forty are 

 regarded as a successful adventure, at the price of a shilling to 

 eighteenpence for each fish. But it was held of higher value 

 in remote times, and an often quoted instance in English His- 

 tory is a proof that it was once deemed a favourite dish at the 

 table of a king. The death of Henry I. was caused by his 

 having indulged too freely in a dish of potted lampreys. The 

 value set on the lamprey is also shown by the fact that it was 

 thought a not unfitting present to be sent by the king to a 

 subject of high rank. King John sent one lamprey to the Earl 



The Mouth of the Petro- 

 mjzon marinus. 



