153 
ROCK GOBY. 
BLACK GOBY. MILLER’s THUMB. 
Black Goby, 
(( t( 
Gohius nigeTf 
(( a 
(( *4 
44 44 
GoMe Boulerot, 
JoNSTON; Table 15, f. 11, 12. 
Willoughby; p. 206, plate N. 12, f. 1. 
LinnjEUS. Cuvier. Bloch ; pi. 38. 
Jenyns; Man., p. 305. 
Tarrell; Br. Fishes, vol. i, p. 281. 
Gunther; Cat. Br, M., vol. iii, p. 11. 
Lacepede. Eisso. 
The name of Black Goby, by which it is often designated, 
cannot with propriety be applied to this fish, which is met 
with most frequently of a mottled greyish brown colour. We 
therefore prefer a name taken from the rocks, among which 
it commonly chooses to live, and where its peculiar habits are 
more remarkably displayed. It is common on shores of this 
description throughout the coasts of the British Islands, and 
from the Mediterranean to the north of Europe. It is also 
abundant in the Baltic, although of smaller size than with us; 
but it is rare in other ground than that mentioned above. 
It is not easy to understand how this fish is able to obtain 
access to some situations in which we find it, and in which it 
reaches its largest size, and becomes adorned with its richest 
colours. It breeds in the open sea, but there are pools in the 
rocks, of such elevation that it is only in very high tides or 
stormy weather that the water of the ocean can fiow into them; 
and into many of them a rill of fresh water is constantly 
dribbling, so that the fluid becomes so fresh as to lose even 
the taste of salt. These are the favourite resort of the larger 
Gobies, and we can only explain how these fish have been 
conveyed into such places, by supposing that they have seized 
VOL. II. ^ 
