MULLETS. 
159 
of which I am able to express my belief that it 
usually selects for food nothing that has life ; 
although it sometimes swallows the common 
sandworm. Its good success in escaping the 
hook commonly proceeds from its care not to 
swallow a particle of any large or hard substance^ 
to avoid which it repeatedly receives the bait into 
its mouth, and rejects it; so that when hooked 
it is in the lips, from which the weight and 
struggles of the fish often deliver it. It is most 
readily taken with bait formed of the fat entrails 
of a fish, or cabbage boiled in broth. 
^^The Grey Mullets shed their spawn about 
Midsummer ; and in August the young, then an 
inch long, are seen entering the fresh-water, 
keeping at some distance above the tide, but re- 
tiring as it recedes. The change and rechange 
from salt water to fresh seems necessary to their 
health, as I judge from having kept them in 
glass vessels.” ^ 
The agility displayed by this fish in escaping 
from danger, and the sagacity which impels it to 
put its powers into requisition, were known to the 
ancients as well as to modern fishermen. The 
continental fishers often lose a whole shoal in the 
manner described by Mr. Couch, a single one 
leaping the net-line, and all the rest following like 
sheep at a fence-gap. To obviate such a disap- 
pointment they use in some parts of the Medi- 
terranean a sort of double net, so formed that the 
exterior net shall receive those fishes that over- 
leap the interior. Oppian long ago thus cele- 
brated the prowess of this fish : — 
* Yarrell’s British Fishes, i. 236. 
