The natural history of our white fish, as I have already said, is but imperfectly known. As an instance of the very limited knowledge we possess of the natural history of even our most favourite fishes, I may state that at a meeting of the British Association a few years ago, a member who read an interesting paper _On the Sea Fisheries of Ireland_, introduced specimens of a substance which the Irish fishermen considered to be spawn of the turbot; stating that wherever this substance was found trawling was forbidden; the supposed spawn being in reality a kind of sponge, with no other relation to fish except as being indicative of beds of mollusca, the abundance of which marks that fish are plentiful. It follows that the stoppage of the trawl on the grounds where this kind of squid is found is the result of sheer ignorance, and causes the loss in all likelihood of great quantities of the best white fish. It is not easy to say when the Gadidæ are in proper season. Some of the members of that family are used for table purposes all the year round; and as different salmon rivers have their different close-times, so undoubtedly will the white fish of different seas or firths have different spawning seasons. In reference, for instance, to so important a fish as the turbot, we are very vaguely told by Yarrell that it spawns in the spring-time, but have no indication of the particular month during which that important operation takes place, or how long the young fish take to grow. Even a naturalist so well informed as the late Mr. Wilson was of opinion that the turbot was a travelling fish, which migrated from place to place. The combined ignorance of naturalists and fishermen has much to do with the scarcity of white fish which is now beginning to be experienced; and unless some plan be hit upon to prevent overfishing, we may some fine morning experience the same astonishment as a country gentleman’s cook, who had given directions to the gamekeeper to supply the kitchen regularly with a certain quantity of grouse. For a number of years she found no lack, but in the end the purveyor threw down the prescribed number, and told her she need look for no more from him, for on that day the last grouse had been shot. “There they are,” said the gamekeeper, “and it has taken six of us with a gun apiece to get them, and after all we have only achieved the labour which was gone through by one man some years ago.” The cook had unfortunately never considered the relation between guns and grouse.