24 



THE ZOOLOGIST. 



Pier, on Nov. 15th, was sent me. It was a stunted fish, 

 measuring 13 in. in length, with a girth of 9^ in. Upon it 

 I found small colonies of a fiddle-shaped crustaceous parasite, 

 which I took to be a Caligus. I sent some to the British Museum, 

 where the species was identified as Caligus curtus. 



There were as many females on this fish as males ; these 

 were still alive on the following day. It would be interesting to 

 come to some satisfactory conclusion as to whether the parasites 

 preferably attach themselves to an already sickly fish, or whether 

 the poor condition follows on their attachment. The fish examined 

 had an excess of mucous juices upon its body, upon which its 

 lodgers apparently subsisted; in such a case they might be more of 



Stuntkd Codfish. 



a boon than a nuisance. Beneden (' Animal Parasites and Mess- 

 mates,' p. 72), with some assurance, concludes that " they live on 

 the produce of cutaneous secretions, and if they improve, as do 

 the ticks, the cleanliness of the host, they are not less useful in 

 a hygienic point of view, for they prevent the accumulation of 

 cutaneous productions." To my mind these "fish-lice" are far 

 more pretty than their vulgar nickname. In the gills of this 

 codling I found an obese Lemea bra7ichialis, and in the stomach 

 a number of thread-like worms. The latter, when dropped in a 

 tube of formalin, formed themselves into a kind of ball, with many 

 loose ends twirling and twisting in a curious manner. Alto* 

 gether, I suspect this poor codling had had a shocking time ! 



A very large Flounder was taken about the same time, 

 crowded with parasites, and was so thin that when held up to 



