of the Squalus maximus. 21 7 
rated, and it is only remarkable that the depositions kept so 
close to the truth as they have done. 
It is of importance to science, that it should be ascertained, 
that this fish is not a new animal unlike any of the ordinary 
productions of nature, and we are indebted to the zeal and 
liberality of Mr. Meason and Mr. Laing, who have collected 
a sufficient body of evidence to enable me to determine that 
point, and prove it to be a Squalus, and the orifice behind the 
eye, which communicates with the mouth met with in the 
skull, renders it ver}^ probable that it is a Squalus maximus. 
This opinion is further confirmed by the Squalus maximus, 
known by the name of the basking shark, being frequently 
seen upon the coast of Scotland. 
That a fish so common in the northern seas, containing a 
large quantity of oil, should have been so rarely caught, and 
indeed that it should not, as well as the whale, become an ob- 
ject of the Greenland fishery, appears, on the first view, not 
easily accounted for ; but Sir Joseph Banks has thrown out a 
suggestion which satisfactorily explains it. The whale, when 
struck, descends towards the bottom of the sea, but is soon 
obliged to rise to the surface to breathe, which enables the 
fishermen to follow, and prevent the breaking of their line ; 
but the Squalus maximus, as it breathes water, has no oc- 
casion to return to the surface, and will always carry off the 
fine. 
EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. 
Plate VI. 
Fig. 1. An engraving of the Squalus maximus caught at 
Hastings in 1808. 
