Exclamare libet, non est hic improbe, non est
Piscis: homo est; hominem, Calliodore, voras.”
Martial, x. 31.
Then, as nowadays, it was considered essential for the enjoyment of this delicacy that the fish should exhibit the red colour of its integuments. The Romans brought it, for that purpose, living into the banqueting room, and allowed it to die in the hands of the guests, the red colour appearing in all its brilliancy during the death struggle of the fish. The fishermen of our times attain the same object by scaling the fish immediately after its capture, thus causing a permanent contraction of the chromatophors containing the red pigment (see p. 183).
Fourth Family—Sparidæ.
Body compressed, oblong, covered with scales, the serrature of which is very minute, and sometimes altogether absent. Mouth in front of the snout, with the cleft lateral. Eye lateral, of moderate size. Either cutting teeth in front of the jaws, or molar teeth on the side; palate generally toothless. One dorsal fin, formed by a spinous and soft portion of nearly equal development. Anal fin with three spines. The lower rays of the pectoral fin are generally branched, but in one genus simple. Ventrals thoracic, with one spine and five rays.
The “Sea-breams” are recognised chiefly by their dentition, which is more specialised than in the preceding families, and by which the groups, into which this family has been divided, are characterised. They are inhabitants of the shores of all the tropical and temperate seas. Their coloration is very plain. They do not attain to a large size, but the majority are used as food.
The extinct forms found hitherto are rather numerous; the oldest come from the cretaceous formation of Mount Lebanon; some belong to living genera, as Sargus, Pagellus; of others from Eocene and Miocene formations no living representative is known—Sparnodus, Sargodon, Capitodus, Soricidens, Asima.
First Group—Cantharina.—More or less broad cutting, sometimes lobate, teeth in front of the jaws; no molars or vomerine teeth; the lower pectoral rays are branched. Partly herbivorous, partly carnivorous. The genera belonging to this group are:—Cantharus from the European and South African coasts, of which one species (C. lineatus), is common on the coasts of Great Britain, and locally known by the names “Old Wife,” “Black Sea-bream;” Box, Scatharus, and Oblata from the Mediterranean and neighbouring parts of the Atlantic; Crenidens and Tripterodon from the Indian Ocean; Pachymetopon, Dipterodon, and Gymnocrotaphus from the Cape of Good Hope; Girella and Tephræops from Chinese, Japanese, and Australian Seas; Doydixodon from the Galapagos Islands and the coasts of Peru.
