94 
TUNNY. 
Wilfred caused them to collect togetlier all their eel-nets, and 
to use them as a scan for catching fishes of all kinds.” (This 
remark of Bede, however, can only be supposed to apply to 
the north of England; for as we have seen that the Phoenicians 
in the earliest ages were accustomed to use a scan, and it is 
known that they traded to the county of Cornwall before the 
days of Moses, it is a reasonable guess that this sort of net 
was introduced among our ancestors by that people. 
But, says Pliny, when caught, the Tunny is cut into pieces, 
of which the neck, beUy, and throat are the most esteemed; 
but they must be eaten only when quite fresh, and even then 
are apt to cause severe attacks of flatulence. The other parts, 
with the entire fish, are preserved in salt; and those pieces 
which resemble an oaken board receive a name from that cir- 
cumstance, and are called melandrya. The parts about the tail 
are the least esteemed. 
“The flsTierman shall here his spoil divide 
To different uses. This when slightly dried 
Is better meat; and tliat when moist is good, 
Whilst other parts are harden’d into food.” 
Manilius, B. t. 
It appears from Aristotle that the Phoenicians, who lived at 
Gades, in Spain, on one occasion sailed westward from the 
Pillars of Hercules for four days, when at some shallow places 
full of sea-weed, they found a very large quantity of Tunnies 
of enormous size; which they caught and salted in jars, and 
afterward conveyed them to Carthage. These fishes thus pre- 
pared were not exported by the Carthaginians, but consumed 
in their own country. — (Notes and Queries.) 
The example selected for description was one of four that 
were taken in the middle of September, entangled in a drift 
net shot for Pilchards. It measured four feet nine inches in 
length, and two feet five inches in girth before the pectoral 
fins; the shape conical from this part to the snout, which is 
pointed; jaws equal when closed, but when open the lower a 
little the longest; teeth numerous, in one row, small, and sunk 
in the jaw. Eyes large and bright; nostrils small, midway 
between the eyes and snout. Scales so closely set on the back 
as not to be distinguished, but, although lying close, perceptible 
on the sides and belly, appearing as if sunk in the surface; no 
