181 
riATESSA. 
MoniH moderate, gape not large; cutting teeth in the jaws, none in 
the roof of the mouth. Dorsal fin beginning only so far forward as 
the npper eye, and neither dorsal nor anal coming near the tail. 
British species have their eyes towards the right. 
PLAICE. 
Willoughby; p. 96, pi. P. 3. 
Cuvier. 
Fleming; Br. Animals, p. 198. 
Jenyns; Manual, p. 454. 
Yaebell; Br. Fishes, vol. ii, p. 297 
Lacepede. Risso. 
Linnaeus. Blocit, pi. 42. 
Donovan, pi. 6. 
Gunther ; Cat. Br. Museum, 
vol. iv, p. 440. 
Among tlie references whicli Willougliby makes to the names 
of this fish there is one to the poems of Ausonius, Epistle 4, 
where it is called mollis platessa; a designation which conveys 
the opinion held by some of our own day, that its flesh is 
too soft to form an acceptable food; while other writers have 
spoken of it in much more favourable terms. Nor is this 
difference of opinion to be ascribed altogether to variety of 
taste in those who have expressed it, since there is reason 
to believe that no inconsiderable variety is found in the quality 
of the fish itself, according to the situation in which it is 
caught; and this again is probably to be ascribed as well to 
the nature of the ground, whether it consist of mud or clean 
sand, as to the quality of the food on which it has been 
feeding; for the latter may well be supposed to exert an 
influence on the delicacy and firmness of its flesh. We have 
Plaice, Passer Bellonii, 
Quadratulus Bondeletii, 
Platessa Ausonii, Plaise, 
Platessa platessa, 
“ vulga/ris, 
it ft 
(( tc 
Pleuronecte plie, 
Pleuronectes platessa, 
ti ft 
(« it 
