HEBRIDAL SIIL-SMELT. 
919 
The abdominal cavity of this species too is black, 
but the pharyngeal cavity white with a coat of silver. 
The black pigment of the abdominal cavity, which here 
too rests on a layer of silvery colour, extends to the 
stomach, which bends abruptly downwards and forwards 
in about a line with the tips of the pectoral tins. Close 
up to the diaphragm the intestine bends no less abruptly 
downwards and backwards, to the right of the liver, 
which is comparatively small, and it is there furnished 
with rather long and thick appendages, varying, as it 
appears, in number. Nilsson counted 14 — 20 of these 
pyloric appendages, we have found 12, and Moreau 
found 10 — 12; Wjlllughby (Ray) counted 6 or 7, and 
Day only 5. The intestine then runs in a straight 
line to the vent, just in front of the anal tin. The 
gall-bladder is thin- walled and oblong. The spleen is 
triangular and lies behind the stomach. The air-bladder 
is long and fusiform, pointed at both ends, and seems 
here, as in the preceding species, to be without con- 
nective duct with the oesophagus. It has long been 
remarked for the rich, highly lustrous coat of silvery 
pigment both without and within its thick wall. 
In the North the Hebridal Siil-Smelt is best known 
as an inhabitant of Christiania Fjord, where it was also 
first observed, by Esmark. From this fjord, says Col- 
lett, where it is caught in Sprat-seines and nets, some- 
times in hundreds at a single haul, it is brought al- 
most daily during autumn to the Christiania market. 
In winter solitary specimens are hooked on the clayey 
bottom. It was in this manner that the specimen re- 
presented in our figure was secured, the only authen- 
ticated instance of the occurrence of this species on the 
Swedish coast. The said specimen was caught on a 
Haddock-line off Helso, 3 miles from Stromstad, about 
Christmas, 1879. Along the Norwegian coast the spe- 
cies has been met with at several places, though in no 
great number, up to Trondhjem Fjord, where it bears, 
according to Strom, the name of Stavsild. Stromsild 
( Stream Herring ), the name by which it is known in 
Christiania Fjord, is derived, according to Nilsson, 
from the circumstance that “the young at least, like 
young Herrings, at certain seasons enter the mouths 
of the rivers, and are found at the outlets of the streams. " 
On both sides of Scotland and off the Yorkshire coast 
solitary specimens have been taken; but the species is 
most common and has longest been known in the Me- 
diterranean, on the coasts of Italy and France. As we 
have already mentioned, it has also been found on the 
coast of Algiers; and it apparently belongs to the New 
Zealand fauna,, far from its European home. Its bathy- 
metric range extends to a depth of at least 200 fathoms, 
for Malm received three specimens which had been 
found in the stomach of a Ling caught at that depth 
on the fishing-bank of Storegg off the Norwegian coast. 
In the stomach of the Hebridal Siil-Smelt Edward 
discovered small crustaceans and Sertularice, Collett 
Anneloids. But as it is also hooked on lines set for 
Haddock and the smaller Codfishes, it apparently feeds 
like them on mollusks and, probably, on small fishes. 
It is a sociable and lively fish, and in the seine it 
wriggles till the scales fall off; but after this, says 
Collett, it floats about helplessly at the surface. Of 
its spawning-season widely different accounts are given. 
According to Risso it, breeds in the Mediterranean in 
spring, and appears on a sandy bottom in April. Yar- 
rell mentions a female, 8 inches in length and full of 
roe, that was taken on the west coast of Scotland in 
June. On the east, coast of Scotland Edward caught 
a male fairly full of milt in October. Collett received 
from the neighbourhood of Stavanger a gravid female 
taken in June; but in Christiania Fjord he found the 
females full of roe in October. The female caught by 
IIansson had extremely small eggs in December, but 
did not seem to have spawned in the course of the 
autumn, in which case the ovaries would probably 
have been still more shrunken". 
In Scandinavia the Hebridal Siil-Smelt has never 
been put to any practical purpose, except perhaps as 
bait on a long-line or hand-line. Its flesh is good, 
according to Risso, but its cucumber-like smell per- 
haps uninviting. Greater advantage has been taken of 
this fish in Italy. There the silvery pigment of its 
air-bladder and scales has long been collected to afford 
material, under the name of essence d'orient, for the 
manufacture of imitation pearls, as we have above 
described when treating of the Bleaks. 
“ Cf. Smitt, Riksmuseets Salmonider , tab. inetr. VII. 
116 
Scandinavian Fishes. 
