=The Dorosomatidæ.=—The gizzard-shad, _Dorosomatidæ_, are closely related to the _Clupeidæ_, differing in the small contracted toothless mouth and reduced maxillary. The species are deep-bodied, shad-like fishes of the rivers and estuaries of eastern America and eastern Asia. They feed on mud, and the stomach is thickened and muscular like that of a fowl. As the stomach has the size and form of a hickory-nut, the common American species is often called hickory-shad. The gizzard-shad are all very poor food-fish, bony and little valued, the flesh full of small bones. The belly is always serrated. In three of the four genera of _Dorosomatidæ_ the last dorsal ray is much produced and whip-like. The long and slender gill-rakers serve as strainers for the mud in which these fishes find their vegetable and animal food. _Dorosoma cepedianum_, the common hickory-shad or gizzard-shad, is found in brackish river-mouths and ponds from Long Island to Texas, and throughout the Mississippi Valley in all the large rivers. Through the canals it has entered Lake Michigan. The Konoshiro, _Clupanodon thrissa_, is equally common in China and Japan. =The Engraulididæ.=—The anchovies (_Engraulididæ_) are dwarf herrings with the snout projecting beyond the very wide mouth. They are small in size and weak in muscle, found in all warm seas, and making a large part of the food of the larger fish. The genus _Engraulis_ includes the anchovy of Europe, _Engraulis encrasicholus_, with similar species in California, Chile, Japan, and Australia. In this genus the vertebræ are numerous, the bones feeble, and the flesh tender and oily. The species of _Engraulis_ are preserved in oil, often with spices, or are made into fish-paste, which is valued as a relish. The genus _Anchovia_ replaces _Engraulis_ in the tropics. The vertebræ are fewer, the bones firm and stiff, and the flesh generally dry. Except as food for larger fish, these have little value, although existing in immense schools. Most of the species have a bright silvery band along the side. The most familiar of the very numerous species is the silver anchovy, _Anchovia browni_, which abounds in sandy bays from Cape Cod to Brazil. Several other genera occur farther southward, as well as in Asia, but _Engraulis_ only is found in Europe. Fossil anchovies called _Engraulis_ are recorded from the Tertiary of Europe. [Illustration: FIG. 43.—A Silver Anchovy, _Anchovia perthecata_ (Goode & Bean). Tampa. ] [Illustration: FIG. 44.—_Notogoneus osculus_ Cope. Green River Eocene. Family _Gonorhynchidæ_. ]