me think they bring forth pretty late in the year, as these did not seem near ready to be excluded; those I saw were of the piked dog. Others cast their purses, called here Crow-purses, in which I suppose their young are included; but with the generation of these I am not so well acquainted, having examined several of them, and found nothing like the rudiment, and only full of a sort of milk. GENUS VI. THE STURGEON. Gen. Char.-One narrow aperture on each side; the mouth placed far below, tubular, and without teeth; the body long, and often angular. Sturgeon, Wil. Icth. 239. 403. Brit. Zool. 96. Species 1.-The Sturgeon. Raii Syn. Pisc. 112. Accipenser Sturio, Lin. Sys. THE Sturgeon has a place here upon the authority of Mr Wallace and others, who say they are drove ashore upon our rocks. I never saw any of these, but heard of one which came ashore in one of the north isles of Orkney some time ago. Upon the whole, I believe it is but a stray fish of this kind that is ever seen in the Orkneys. 1 GENUS VII.—THE LUMP-FISH. Gen. Char.-Thick body; arched back; ventral fins united; four branchiostegous rays. Species 1.-The Lump-Fish. Lump or Sea-Owl; Scotis, Cock-Paddle, Wil. Icth. 208. Raii Syn. Pisc. 77. Cyclopterus Lumpus, Lin. Sys. 414. Lumpus Anglorum, nostratibus the Cock-Paddle, Sib. Scot. 24. Brit. Zool. 103. Brit. Zool. Illus. 28, tab. 29, fig. 1, 2. Orc. Padle. THE Padle, as it is here called, is very frequent in our harbours, especially on the sand-banks, where I have seen half a dozen drawn ashore in`a net at once, but never of any great bulk. It is an oddly-shaped creature; the back rises into a sort of hunch, on which is a part something resembling the comb of a cock; the side of the belly and sides have rows of hard tubercles, running along them towards the tail; the whole skin is rough, and the colour of those found in our harbour is black on the back, and greenish on the belly; whether they change colour as they increase in bulk, I know not. The most curious part of this curious fish is a hollow under the pectoral fins, by which it adheres with great firmness to the stones, or any thing else where it can fix itself, so that when once it is fixed there is no removing it, and the stone may sooner be moved than it pulled away. This part, I imagine, acts much in the same manner as the circular piece of wet leather, which children use to run a string through the centre of, and clapping it on a stone, by the action of the air it is held with great force, so as to lift a very large stone, and sustain it as long as the leather continues moist, and the outward air is excluded by its closely embracing the solid body. Species 2.-The Sea-Snail. Liparis nostras Dunelm. et Eborac. Sea-Snail, Wil. Icth. App. 17. Raii Syn. Pisc. 74. Cyclopterus Liparis, Lin. Sys. 414. Brit. Zool. 105. Brit. Zool. Illus. 28, tab. 29, fig. 3, 4. THE Sea-Snail is found under the stones round the shores of many places of Orkney, but no place more frequent than that at the point of the Ness of Stromness, where they may be picked up in dozens. The colour is a fine pale brown, stripped with lines of a darker brown, which run in many directions, forming a vast variety of labyrinthiform figures on its sides and back; but these are only seen immediately on its being taken out of the water; in half an hour they all vanish, and with them the beauty of the fish, owing to the quick decay of its melting tex ture. The head is large; no teeth; the pectoral fins unite under the throat, and under them is a sucker, something similar to, and serving the same purpose as that observed in the lumpfish; the dorsal fin runs from the hind part of the head to the tail; the anal the same below; the measure of those I have observed in these parts seldom exceeds four inches, though many of them are not so large. GENUS VIII.—THE PIPE-FISH, OR SEA-NEEDLE. Gen. Char.-Nose long and tubular; no orifice to the gills; the breathing apertures on the hind part of the head; no ventral fins; the body covered with a strong crust. Species 1.-The Longer Pipe-Fish. Acus nostras cauda serpentina, Sib. Scot. 24, tab. 19, fig. 3. Syngnathus barbarus, Lin. Sys. 417. Brit. Zool. 106, tab. 6, fig. 2. I HAVE had occasion to see great numbers of these fishes, but all dry, therefore shall describe it from the British Zoology, and Sir Robert Sibbald's Prodrom. Nat. Hist. Scotiæ, giving the measurement of the different parts from specimens in my own possession, as I never saw, nor had one so long or thick as described either by Mr Pennant or Sir Robert Sibbald. The largest I ever saw on our coasts, measured, from the nose to the point of the tail, twelve inches; to the eye half an inch; to the beginning of the back-fin four inches; the back-fin, which was all it had, one inch and three quarters long; from the end of that fin to the point of the tail six inches; the body about the thickness of a pretty large quill; the nose was compressed sidewise; the end of the lower mandible turned up; the aperture of the mouth very small. The irides were red; behind each eye was a deep brown line. The body was angular, but the angles not very sharp, and not easily seen till the fish was dried; the belly was slightly carinated, and marked along the middle with a dusky line. The general colour of the fish was an olive brown; the sides marked with bluish lines, pointing from the back to the belly, which, in a dried fish, looked like the signs of so many joints. Those in a fresh subject ceased beyond the vent; all beyond that was spotted with brown; the dorsal fin was narrow and thin, consisting of thirty-eight rays. The vent (in mine) was five inches from the nose; the body to that was of an equal thickness, but from thence tapered to a very small point, having no mark of a fin. It was covered with numbers of angular crusts, finely radiated from their centre; but these do not appear so well in this as the next species to be described. Mr Pennant adds, they are viviparous, and hundreds of minute young ones had been forced out of one of them. |