S46 
CO’GER. 
the minute creatures (mites) which are bred in stale wheaten 
flour were employed to feed on, and so remove the oily particles, 
and hasten the drying. 
But the fishery for Congers has been becoming more unsuc- 
cessful for several years; as, in the west at least, has been the 
case with those other kinds which are usually taken with the 
line; and the circumstance can only be explained by the belief 
of the evil influence of the repeated tearing up of the ground 
on which, in the deeper water, they are bred. It has been 
not uncommon for a boat with three men to bring on shore 
from five hundred-weight to four times that amount; but a much 
less quantity is more recently considered a favourable adventure, 
and those also considerably less in size; as regard which at a 
distant date I possess a note of an example that weighed one 
hundred and four pounds, with others of eighty-six and ninety. 
This last-mentioned fish was in length seven feet two inches, 
with a girth of twenty-seven inches; and another, which was 
of the more ordinary weight of fifty-six pounds, was eight feet 
in length, and in girth about two feet. The general form is 
much like that of the Eel— long, slender, round anteriorly, 
flattened towards the tail. The head widened at the hinder 
part, narrowing forward to the snout, which projects over the 
lower jaw; temporal muscles close together on the top of the 
head; the space from between the eyes to the snout arched 
over; three plaits in front, and on each side of them a short, 
flat, blunt barb, having an aperture; a single round open 
nostril on the border between the plaits and the barb. Eyes 
level with the surface, large and bright; lips fleshy at the 
sides; a single close-set row of teeth in each jaw, and a bed 
of them in front of the palate. Gill openings small, in front 
of the pectoral fins, and a little below the line of their root; 
lateral line straight, dotted through its length with a row of 
white points. The single dorsal fin begins nearer the head 
than in the Eel, being oidy a little behind the border of the 
pectorals; the anal runs from the vent to join it in forming 
the tail; pectorals round. The colour almost or altogether 
black, except the belly, when living on rocky ground, lead or 
cream-coloured when on sand or open ground. 
An abundant distribution of nerves to the mouth, lips, barbs 
on the upper lips, folds, and single nostrils, is the cause and 
