PLATE XLI. 
Sun-fish from Mount’s-Bay. Borlase Cornwall. 268. tab. 26./. 1 f - 
Oblong Sun-fish. Penn. Brit. Zool. V. 3. p. 100. n. 1. 
Dr. Borlase appears to be the first, and almost only English writer, 
•who has seen and described this fish. In his Natural History of 
Cornwall, he speaks of it under the title of the Sun-fish from Mount’s 
Bay, and mentions one that was taken at Plymouth in 1T34, that 
weighed five hundred pounds. Whether Mr. Pennant ever had an 
opportunity of inspecting this species is uncertain ; the figure given 
of it in the British Zoology, as well as that of the Short Diodon, 
Tetrodon Mola, is certainly an indifferent copy from the plate of 
Borlase. 
The principal fishery for the short Sun-fish, is carried on upon the 
Western coasts, those of Cornwall in particular, where the oblong or 
truncated Sun-fish is sometimes found in company with the other 
sort. There are instances of the truncated Sun-fish being caught of 
an enormous size upon that coast. We have once seen the dried 
skin of this species, the animal of which, when living, weighed 
between two and three hundred pounds. Our figure is taken from a 
small specimen, obtained in a recent state, in one of our fishing excur- 
sions on the Bristol channel. The dorsal fin in this, contains twelve 
rays : pectoral fourteen : anal fifteen, and tail seventeen. This fish 
subsists on worms of the testaceous and other tribes, small crabs, & c ' 
fragments of these being found on dissection in the stomach. 
The truncated Sun-fish is described by the judicious Borlase a * 
being altogether distinct from the other kind , and Mr. Pennant is t0 
