. American fishes : a popular treatise upon the game and food fishes of North America with especial reference to habits and methods of capture. Fishes -- North America. 220 AMERICAN FISHES. the sieve-like flooring of the ' camera della morte ' was drawn within a few feet of the surface, a mixed multitude of large fish, chiefly of the scomber family, all in violent agitation at what they saw and heard (for the men were now gaily singing at the ropes), dashed and splashed about, till the whole enclosure Avas covered with foam. The work of slaughter soon commenced, and these great creatures, desp
. American fishes : a popular treatise upon the game and food fishes of North America with especial reference to habits and methods of capture. Fishes -- North America. 220 AMERICAN FISHES. the sieve-like flooring of the ' camera della morte ' was drawn within a few feet of the surface, a mixed multitude of large fish, chiefly of the scomber family, all in violent agitation at what they saw and heard (for the men were now gaily singing at the ropes), dashed and splashed about, till the whole enclosure Avas covered with foam. The work of slaughter soon commenced, and these great creatures, despatched by blows, were hauled without difficulty on board the barge.* The chamber being now empty, was let down again for new victims, while we followed the cargo just shipped to the land-place ; thence, preceded by two drummers, off we went in a procession to the Mercato Reale, where we found many great eyeless thunny (the produce of a still earlier haul) already piled up in bloody heaps on the flags, f Besides these, there were alalongas, whose long pectorals had been draggled in the mire, with many other large and curi- ous fish, and the formidably armed heads of two or three sword-fish, fixed on end in the upper part of the woodwork of the same stalls, where their huge bodies were exposed for sale below, cut up into bloodless white masses, like so many coarse fillets of veal; while whole hampers of labridae attracted the least attentive eye by their lovely variegated and ever-vary- ing tints. * Sometimes, we are told, when a very colossal thunny is caught, one of the crew mounts his back, and will ride him, as Arion did the dolphin, several times round the inner enclosure, patting and taming him before he is stabbed like his smaller companions. fThe eyes, being a perquisite of the crew, are torn out the first thing, to make oil for their lamps : the gills also and the roes, which are eaten fresh, are commonly ripped out ind deposited in baskets by themselves. These various m
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