520 
SCANDINAVIAN FISHES. 
and owing to its voracity is caught freely before and 
after the spawning-season — even during this period, 
for all Hakes do not spawn at the same time — it soon 
results that an adequate number of adult individuals 
is not forthcoming. In this case the fish must become 
rare, until the fishermen have had time to desert the 
station as unproductive, and a new stock of adult fish 
has assembled or grown to maturity, and been per- 
mitted to breed in peace for a generation or two. 
When fresh the Hake is regarded as an inferior 
fish, especially when it is caught on a muddy bottom. 
On a stony and hard bottom it is said to be of better 
quality. Salted and dried, like the other Codfishes, 
in the form of stockfish, rotkiaars etc., the Hake is 
said to be nearly as good as Cod prepared in the 
same manner. In this form considerable quantities are 
exported to Roman Catholic countries, and consumed 
during Lent, when meat is forbidden. 
In the Cattegat the Hake is caught partly with 
long-lines and partly with hand-lines used for other 
fish. On the fishing-bank described above the fishery 
is carried on during the spawning-season, at the end 
of -July and beginning of August, with hand-lines and 
Haddock-lines. The bait consists of Herring or, still 
better, of Mackerel, and sometimes of a bit of the fish 
taken from the belly of the Hakes already caught. 
Hundreds of boats, usually with a crew of three men, 
assemble there, and if the fishery is successful, a single 
forenoon will suffice to give them a full load. On the 
coast of Brittany the Hake is the object of a fairly 
important fishery, pursued in the open sea, partly with 
nets and partly with lines, in large boats, each with 
a crew of nine men. This fishery is carried on only 
at night, and affords employment to a large number 
of persons. 
(SuNI)E VALL, SiMITT.) 
Genus MOLUA. 
Two fully developed dorsal f ns and one anal fin. Vertical fins well separated, in adult specimens with a distinct, 
finless peduncle of the tail. Ventral fins with six rays. Caudal fin more or less rounded. Intermaxillary teeth of 
fairly uniform size, hut the teeth in the lower jaw and on the head of the vomer interspersed 
with, large canines. Branch lost eg at rays 7. 
This genus, which was combined by Cuvier with the 
following one, was first separated from it by Nilsson", 
though, like Fleming 6 , he had previously 0 employed the 
same generic name for the group which Cuvier and Risso 
called Lotta. The name of Molua, as well as Morrhua 
{Morhua), is a Latinized form of the French morue, and 
was applied by Rondelet' 7 to the Cod, but altered by 
Aldrovande to Molva and employed by Charleton* for 
both the Ling and the Cod. As in the case of the pre- 
ceding genus, we restore the original name, by which 
course we are enabled without absolute tautology to re- 
tain the Linmean specific name of the type of the genus. 
The genus possesses its principal systematic im- 
portance in the capacity of an intermediate stage be- 
tween the preceding genus and the following one. This 
appears most distinctly in the structure of the second 
dorsal and the anal fins, which in one species, our 
common Ling, are almost entirely without that trace 
of division which we have observed in the preceding 
genus, but in the second species, Molua dipterygia, do 
not indeed show these traces as distinctly as Merlucius, 
but still plainly enough. In Molua clipterygia the caudal 
fin is much more abruptly rounded — thus coming 
nearer Merlucius — than in our common Ling, which 
in this respect also more nearly resembles the Burbot. 
The number of rays in the ventral fins (less than 7), a 
number which may, however, occur in Lotta, and the can- 
ine teeth in the lower jaw and on the vomer are, there- 
fore, the most trustworthy characters of the genus Molua. 
Molua is further distinguished from Lotta by the smaller 
breadth of the interorbital space 7 , the shorter ventral 
fins 5 ', the narrower (less terete) form of the body 7 ', and 
a Skand. Fn., Fisk., p. 573 (1855). 
h Brit. Aniin ., p. 192. 
c Prodr. Ichth. Scand., p. 45 (1832). 
d De Pise., lib. IX, cap. XIV. 
e Onomast. Zoic., p. 121. Molva major (the Ling) and Molva minor (the Cod). 
As a rule less than 
of the length of the head. 
<J Less than 12 % of the length of the body. 
h Greatest breadth of the body as a rule less than 45 % of the length of the head. 
