Читать книгу The History of Esculent Fish - Roger North - Страница 7

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Is, according to the Artedian system, of the genus of Gadi. It is called by Salvian the Asellus Major, or Greater Asellus, and by Turner and Willoughby the Orus, or Asinus of the Ancients. Charlton tells us, that it was the Callaris Galeris, or Galaxis, of the old Romans, mentioned by Pliny; but Artedi has some doubt about that. It is likewise called by Artedi the Gadus; with a bearded mouth, three fins on the back, a whitish body, with the upper jaw longest; the tail a little forked. Large Haddocks begin to be in roe about the middle of November, and continue so till the end of January; from that time till May, their tails grow thin, and they are out of season.

The small ones are very good from May to February; and those which are not old enough to breed in February, March, and April. It is said by fishermen, that in rough weather they hide themselves in the sand at the bottom of the sea, and among the ooze, and shelter themselves till the storm is over, because they take none in stormy weather. They live in the summer on young Herrings, and on other young fish; and in winter, on a species of sespula, called the stone-coated Worm, and by the fishermen, Haddock-meat. The great shoals of Haddocks come periodically on the coast of Yorkshire. The large ones quit the coast as soon as they get out of season, and leave behind them a number of small ones. They are said to visit the coasts of Hamburgh and Jutland in the summer. There is a large black spot on each side of the Haddock, ascribed by superstition to the mark which St. Peter’s thumb made, when he took the tribute money out of the mouth of a species of this fish.

Halec. The Herring. E. Albin Del: 1739.