PORBEAGLE. 
43 
pilchards and herrings, and other small fishes that then abound. 
Risso represents it as swift and eager after prey, and certainly 
It IS not less fierce than other Sharks; and I have been in- 
formed of an instance, where in the prospect of being taken. 
It sprung at a fisherman, and tore a piece out of his clothing’ 
Ihe teeth, which present a formidable array of spears, are 
less formed for cutting than for seizing and holding its prey; 
which therefore it appears to swallow whole. I have found 
the remains of cartilaginous fishes and cuttles fSepice) in their 
stomacliSj 3.11(1 in one instance full-grown hakes 
According to Risso it is an article of food in the Mediter- 
ranean, and he goes so^ far as to say that as such it is much 
esteemed. This is a piece of luxury to which our fishermen 
and the public have not yet attained; and consequently with 
us it is only employed as manure. 
The spiral valve in the entrails of this fish is strongly marked. 
The example described was four feet in length, and two feet 
in circumference just before the pectoral fins; the appearance, 
therefore, solid and heavy, and explaining the meaning of its 
name— the hog-hound. The snout prominent and round, thickly 
co\ered with small apertures; the nostrils single, small, and 
not lobed; mouth krge, armed with rows of sharp prominent 
teeth, each tooth with a smaller process at the root on each 
side, the rows of teeth varying according to size, but in the 
fish described only two uncovered. Eye prominent, no spir- 
acle; the gill openings reaching up the side of the 'body, 
their extent increasing from the first anteriorly. Body round,’ 
depressed nearer the tail, with a notch above and below at the’ 
root of that organ, a prominent ridge at the side of the body 
near the tail, and a slight one below it on the tail itself. First 
dorsal fin elevated, and triangular; the second dorsal and anal 
small and opposite each other; upper lobe of the tail without 
a notch in some examples; but it extends beyond the lower, 
contrary to the definition of Rafinesque. The skin slightly rough. 
Colour black on the back and fins, lighter on the sides, and 
white below. 
I have been informed of an example that weighed eight 
hundred pounds, and another of large size will presently be 
described. This latter had the remarkable singularity of being 
much disfigured by a large lobulated cancerous tumour in its 
