ESOCID^E. 131 



Dr. Mitchill mentions the mesogaster as an inhabitant of the sea of New York ; and Dr. 

 Smith enumerates it among the fish of Massachusetts ; but the notice of the former is too 

 slight to prove that he has applied the name rightly, though sufficient to show that he is not 

 speaking of the species which he has figured as the New York Flying-fish ; and the latter writer 

 gives no descriptions or figures in his work, whereby a naturalist may judge of the correctness 

 of his determination of the species. The E. volitans, the most common species in the Atlantic, 

 has small ventrals situated before the middle of the body. Both forms occur in the Pacific. 

 Lieutenant-Colonel Smith makes the following remark on an exocetus which he observed off 

 the Isle of Sable, near Nova Scotia. " I would have taken it for mesogaster or exiliens, but 

 the wings, instead of being rounded beneath, were very unequally and acutely two-lobed, by a 

 notch extending obliquely to near their lower margin; the eye was very large, the scales 

 broad ; the colour greenish- grey ; and the length about ten inches. 



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