Fishes. 4721 



admirable fishes lived by or on suction, or on water merely, or on 

 nothing, as some would have us believe, was unfounded, he was greatly 

 surprised and pleased. Thus was this most difficult problem solved 

 at last. I am aware that there are some, but still, I hope, for the honour 

 of my countrymen, few, who say that the solving such a problem as 

 this is a perfectly simple matter — of no value in science, and scarcely 

 meriting notice ; yet strange to say that, in respect of all the fishes 

 enumerated, amongst which we may include the salmon, the problem 

 had avowedly remained unsolved from the earliest recorded period until 

 that of my own investigations. It would seem also that Dr. M'Cullagh 

 gave an early attention to this matter, and conjectured that the herring 

 preyed on the Medusae ; but he made no inquiries into the subject. 

 Lastly, it has been asserted that Leuwenhock had detected Entomo- 

 straca in the stomach of the herring. There is not a single passage 

 in the Memoirs of this celebrated observer furnishing the smallest 

 hint for the belief that he ever detected the Entomostraca in the 

 stomach of the herring, and his remarks are as follow: — "After much 

 turning this matter in my thoughts, I had a fancy to know what is the 

 food of this fish (the herring) ; and for that purpose I inquired of 

 many men used to this fishing, what food they generally found in the 

 stomachs of herrings when first caught, but the constant answer I got 

 from them was that they never found any. At length 1 met with a 

 merchant who fits out ships for the herring fishery, and from him I 

 learned that in a certain tract of sea near the coast of Scotland herrings 

 are caught, in the stomachs of which are found some kinds of small 

 fishes, but that those herrings will not keep long." " Not content with 

 this," continues Leuwenhock, " I determined to wait for the season 

 when certain herrings are brought to our town, which, as I have heard, 

 are caught in great numbers not far from Amsterdam." 



Thus it would appear that to practical men, fishermen, merchants, 

 Dutchmen, who turned over millions of florins and guilders annually 

 from this great staple, the food of that fish by which they lived and 

 throve was itself as unknown as it is at this day to the same class of 

 men in Britain ; that is, fishermen, who deny that it lives on anything ; 

 fishermen who say that it lives upon suction, but without attaching the 

 smallest meaning to the word suction. But Leuwenhock says that he 

 " was not content" with the answers of fishermen and merchants, so 

 he commenced opening the stomachs of some fresh herrings caught in 

 the Zuvder Zee. Failing in all attempts to ascertain the real food of 

 the herring, he came to the conclusion that herrings not only "feed 

 on small fishes and even on their own eggs, but that when urged by 



