COTTOIDE.E. 00 



single spinous ray, and the gill-rays do not exceed three. The Burnstickles, or 

 Sticklebacks, are the smallest of European fresh-water fishes, and probably also 

 the most abundant, as they exist in almost every rivulet and piece of water. They 

 are active, lively little fish, and when any obstacle obstructs their way, will leap a 

 foot out of the water, in endeavouring to surmount it. They are exceedingly vora- 

 cious, and commit great havoc in fish-ponds, where they devour vast numbers of 

 young fish at the instant of their exclusion from the roe. The G. aculeatus (L.), 

 or the Three-spined Stickleback, the largest species, abounds in every corner of 

 Europe *, and even extends to Greenland, if the Kakilhak of Fabricius, above 

 referred to, be actually this species, and not one of the very similar American ones. 

 This author states, that it inhabits every pool and rivulet of Greenland, and even 

 those into which the tide enters, feeding on worms and aquatic insects. In Europe 

 two species were long confounded under the appellation of aculeatus, until Cuvier 

 distinguished them by the names of G. trachurus and leiurus. 



In both species the forepart of the back is covered by five bony plates, on the second, third, 

 and fifth of which stand the three dorsal spines. The third spine is sometimes wanting, and 

 at other times the fourth plate gives origin to an extra spine. The flanks are protected by a 

 series of oblong plates having their axes vertical : in G. trachurus these plates are con- 

 tinued along the sides of the tail, there being in all twenty-five or twenty-six, exclusive of five 

 small ones that cover the keel of the tail and render it more prominent ; in G. leiurus the six 

 anterior plates only are present, the posterior parts of the fish being smooth. 



Fins.— Br. 3; D. 1/ — 1/ — 1/ 10 or 11 ; A. 1/— 9; C. 12|; P. 10; V. 1/1. 



Fabricius says that the Kakilisak seldom exceeds the little finger in length, that its forehead 

 is marked with black in form of a spade, and its anal fin contains ten soft rays besides the 

 spine: in other respects he refers to Artedi's description (Sp., p. 96), which is that of G. tra- 

 churus. 



Five other European three-spined Burnstickles are described in the Histoire des 

 Poissons, and there is one in the sea of Kamtschatka, which, at the summer sol- 

 stice, ascends the rivers of Awatska, Paradunca, &c, in such dense shoals that it 

 may be taken up with a pitcher in equal quantity with the water itself. It is named 

 G. obolarius t, but the detailed descriptions of Steller, Pallas, and Tilesius do not 

 indicate any characters so decided that Cuvier could pronounce it to be a distinct 

 species. It derives its name from the smooth silvery spot which intervenes 



* In certain places it appears occasionally in enormous shoals, so that it is taken for the purpose of manuring the land. 

 A labourer, hired by a Lincolnshire farmer to collect it in the river Welland, at the rate of one halfpenny a bushel, earned 

 four shillings a day. {Brit. Zool.) 



f " Obolarius aculeatus, Steller, Mss." " Gasleracanthus cataphractus, Pall,, Faun. Ross." 1 Gasterosteus cata- 

 phraclus, Tilesius, Mem. de Petersb.. iii., p. 225. 



