.5o;> 
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Arges, Brontes, and Steropes. Their number was 
greater according to other mythologifts, and in the age 
of Ulyffes, Polyphemus was their king. They inhabited 
the weftern parts of the ifland of Sicily ; and becatife 
they were uncivilized in their manners, the poets fpeak 
of them as mcn-eaters. The tradition of their having 
only one eye, originates from their cuftoin of wearing 
fmall bucklers of Heel which covered their faces, and 
had a fmall aperture in the middle, which correfponded 
exaftly to the eye. From their vicinity to mount ^Etna, 
they have been fuppofed to be the workmen of Vulcan, 
and to have fabricated the thunderbolts of Jupiter. 
The molt folid walls and impregnable fortrefles were 
faid, among the ancients, to be the work of the Cyclops, 
to render them more refpe£table; and we find that Ju¬ 
piter was armed with what they had fabricated, and that 
the fiiield of Pluto, and the trident of Neptune, were 
the produce of their labour. The Cyclops were reckoned 
among the gods, and we find a temple dedicated to their 
fervice at Corinth, where facrifices were folemnly offered. 
Apollo deftroyed them all, becatife they had made the 
thunderbolts of Jupiter, with which his ion yEfculapius 
had been killed. From the different accounts given of 
the Cyclops by the ancients, it may be concluded that 
they were all the fame people, to whom various func¬ 
tions have been attributed, which cannot be reconciled 
one to the other, without drawing the pencil of fidtion 
or mythology. Apollodorus. 
CYCLOP'TERUS, f, [cyclopterus, Lat. from the ven¬ 
tral fins being difpofed in a circle or difk.] The Sucker ; 
in ichthyology, a genus of fiflies belonging to the order 
of branchioftegi. The generic characters are, the ven¬ 
tral fins united into a circular form, or rather certain 
round excrefcences inftead of ventral fins ; the body is 
thick, without feales ; the mouth opens forwards; and 
the jaws are armed with little (harp teeth ; the aperture 
of the gills is fmall, and lies on the Tides; the covert is 
one fmall plate, under which lie four gills on each fide. 
In many, the body is tuberculated ; all have five fins for 
fwimming, and two for holding: they live in the fea, 
feeding upon infetfts, worms, and fmall fifti. This genus 
is found in the north of Europe, and in America ; it was 
entirely unknown to the Greeks and Romans. The fpe- 
cies are as follow : 
i. Cyclopterus lumpus, the lump-fucker, or lump- 
fifli : its fpecific charadber is, feven rows of tubercles on 
the body. There are four rays in the membrane of the 
gills, twenty in the pedtoral fin, fix in the ventral, twelve 
in the anal, and ten in the dorfal. One rov r of the tu¬ 
bercles is on the back, three on each fide, the lowermoft 
of which are on the rim of the belly ; they are hard, 
with radii, and end in ffiarp points ; the upper row- is 
placed on a protruded ikin, or fatty membrane ; between 
which membrane and the dorfal fin there are on each fide 
from three to five large tubercles, and the fame number 
over the eyes: belides thefe, there is an infinite number 
all over the Ikin, making it rough to the touch. The 
head is fliort, the forehead broad ; the noftrils cylindri¬ 
cal, and lie near the mouth, which is wide, with large 
lips ; the jaws and the bones of the throat are armed 
with a number of (harp teeth ; the tongue is thick, 
fimooth, and moveable ; the pupil of the eye black, iris 
white; the belly, efpecially in the males, is bright 
Orange-colour, as are the rays of the anal and pectoral 
fins; but fometimes the belly is grey. The female is 
much larger than the male : the Tides, and the rays of 
the dorfal and anal fins, are grey, with black dots; the 
back is black, arched and {harp ; but the Tides and belly 
are broad ; the belly is diftinguithed by an oval aperture, 
fiirrounded with a flclhy and mufcular fubftance, and 
edged with fmall thready appendages, which operate as 
To many clalpers. It is by means of this apparatus that 
thefe animals adhere with inch vaft force to any fubftance 
to which they apply themfelves. The tenacity with 
which the fucker adheres to the bottom, has been tried 
Vo l. V. No. 291. 
C Y, C 
by putting it into a pail of water, where it fixed ilfelt fo 
firmly, that on taking the fifli by the tail, the whole vef- 
fel,with its contents, were lifted from the ground, al¬ 
though it held fome gallons. It is well known with 
what force a perfectly fmooth body will adhere to a 
damp one : Hanov calculates, that the fifti with which 
lie made an experiment, though only eight inches long, 
had a ftrength of refiftance equal to feventy-four pounds. 
The anus if in the middle of the body ; all the rays ot 
the fins are forked. 
The lump-fucker is found in the Northern Ocean, and 
the Baltic Sea ; it is the largeft of the genus, and grows 
a foot and a half or two feet in length ; but fome are very 
thick and very broad. It is caught on feveral parts ot 
the Britifli coafts ; and, though its flefh is held in no 
great eftimation, it is frequently feen for Idle in the 
London market. The great refort of this fpecies is the 
North Sen, upon the coafts of Greenland. While it 
prowls upon the top, the feals fwarm beneath, watching 
an opportunity to devour it. Infinite numbers fall a 
prey to thefe animals, who fwallow all but the fkin; 
vaft quantities of which, thus emptied by the feals, are 
feen floating above during the fpring months, when the 
fuckers approach near the land, for the purpofeof depo- 
fiting their fpawn. Every diflrift where the feals carry- 
on their depredation, is eafily diftinguifhed by the failors, 
on account of the fmoothnefs of the water : wherever 
any oily filh lias been devoured below, the water at the 
top becomes tranquil, it being uniformly found to be a 
property of oil to calm the agitation of the waves. 
The inhabitants of the barren trafts of Greenland, who 
are obliged to draw a great part of their fuftenance from 
the lea, avail themfelves alfo of this filh ; the roe is re¬ 
markably large, and in the fummer months they take 
them on account of it; when boiled, it forms an ex¬ 
tremely fat, oily, food ; a kind of repaft, of which the 
neceflities of the Greenlanders have rendered them ex¬ 
ceedingly fond. It is often ufed for bait, and is very 
ulefill in catching holibut. In Iceland, they fifli up a 
confiderable quantity of the lump-fucker; they eat it 
frefti or falted ; or dry it for fale; previous to drying, 
they hang them up, cut off the tail, fins, and the thin 
parts of the belly. They are often taken in the nets 
with falmon. They watch for their prey, like the lea- 
devil, concealed behind a mound, or fattened to a piece 
of rock, and fo catch the little fifties driven along by 
the waves. They fpawn in March, and multiply greatly; 
but their numbers are often thinned by the (hark and 
other voracious fifli, particularly the feal, as mentioned 
before, and the otter. This fpecies is faid to enjoy the 
fenfes of fight, hearing, and touch, in a high degree. 
The ventral cavity is fliort, but wide. In a fifli ten 
inches long, two ovaries were found, eacli eight inches 
long, four wide, and one thick; the whole fiih weighed 
fix pounds and a half, the ova two pounds and a quarter 
of an ounce; they were counted to the number of 
207,700, of an orange-colour, fomewhat larger than 
poppy-feed. The inteftinal canal was eleven feet long, 
being very much coiled up, and was attached to the me. 
fentery, as in quadrupeds; this canal has feveral appen¬ 
dices, fo that, upon the whole, the cavity for containing 
food is fix or feven times as long as the animal itfelf, a 
very extraordinary phenomenon in filh ? as this fifti is 
greedy, and a bad l’wimmer, nature has beftowed this 
great length of inteftinal canal, that the prey, which it 
catches but feldom, may remain long in the body, and 
preferve its nutritive properties. 
The fpinojvs , or prickly lump-fith, is a variety of this. 
It differs in having feales of various fizes irregularly dif¬ 
pofed on the back and Tides, with a long {pine in the 
middle of each feale. Cepede makes it a feparate fpe¬ 
cies. The firft dorfal fin is fuftained by fix diftin6t rays, 
which he makes part of the fpecific character; the fe= 
cond dorfal has eleven rays, each pefforal fin twenty- 
three, each ventral fix, the anal and tail ten each. It* 
6 Q colon? 
