S92 
SEA I.AMPREY. 
only by a lighter sand. A stone of the weight of two pounds 
has been known to be thus carried to a sufficient distance; 
and Mr. Thompson reports on the authority of a fisherman that 
stones of even ten or twelve pounds have been turned over. 
Soon after spawning the parent fish return to the sea. 
As the manner in which the water is received by this fish 
for the purpose of breathing, has been described in a way that 
is contrary to my observations, the following notes are given 
from my own examination of the subject; derived chiefly from 
a large example taken in the sea; — When this fish was altogether 
immersed in the water, the fluid was seen to enter by the orifice 
on the head, and was discharged through the branchial orifices 
at the sides. When these orifices on one of the sides were 
out of the water it was still discharged through both, but with 
less force ; but when the aperture on the head and the branchial 
orifices on one side were equally out of the water, although 
the fluid ran out for a short time, as if what had been adhering 
to the gills within supplied itj yet afterwards it ceased with 
something of a sucking motion, as if the gills were drawing 
without being supplied. But on a further trial with the same 
fish, when the whole body was immersed in the water, a constant 
current was discharged from, not inhaled by, the aperture on 
the head, in common with the gills; but when the head was 
lifted above the water, and all besides immersed, the current 
ceased from the head, although it continued from the gills. 
When the mouth was lifted from the water, and the aperture 
on the head was immersed, no water entered by the latter, 
although the current ceased from the gills: a circumstance not 
easily explained, except on the supposition that the powers of 
life, usually of an enduring kind, were about to cease. 
This fish inhabits climates between the very warm and very 
cold; it is therefore found in the Mediterranean; and also in 
the north of Europe; where it is mentioned by Nilsson as 
common in the Baltic and North Seas; but it is not mentioned 
by Fabricius in Greenland. 
The example described was obtained from the Severn, and 
measured two feet eight inches in length, and six inches and 
a half round the body where stoutest; which was at the last 
spiracle; round anteriorly, more compressed towards the tail; 
rather flat on the head, and when the mouth is closed bluntly 
