An Account of a Very Large Eel, Lately Caught at Maldon in Essex; with Some Considerations about the Generation of Eels, by Mr. Dale

en les battant avec un marteau, afin que la matière suivante y tienne tant mieux. Cela fait, prenez de l'eau de vie forte, meslez y de la poudre à canon en farine, tant que tout soit en consistance d'une bouill & frottez en lez meches avec un pinieceau, & espardez encore dessus, de la poudre en farine. Ainsi on laisse le tout sécher & il sera préparé à l'usage. VII. An Account of a very large Eel, lately caught at Maldon in Essex; with some Considerations about the Generation of Eels, by Mr. Dale. To meet with Accounts and Descriptions of very large Congers or Sea-Eales, is not a thing rare or uncommon, among the Writers of Natural History, and, among the rest, the Learned and most Ingenious Mr. John Ray, my very good Friend and Neighbour, in his Ichthyographia, pag. 11. describes it to be a very large Fish, in these Words, Piscis est longissimus, quatuor vel quinque Cubitorum longitudinem non raro attingens, & se. moris humani craisstiem equans. Consonant to which, Aldrovandus Lib. de Pisc. P. 134. saith, Sape in quatuor aut quinque Cubitorum longitudinem excrescit; and for Weight, Salvianus writes, Non majores se vidisse quam triginta librarum: Near to which Weight, Mr. Daniel, an Apothecary of Colchester, lately told me of one (if I mis-remember not) that amounted to 27 or 28 Pounds. But if we may believe what Eudoxus writes, some are of a prodigious Magnitude; for he in his Book *De Terra Motu apud Athenium*, Lib. 6. saith, Congros multos in Sicyone capi quos Homo vix ferat; horumque aliquos etiam esse plaustrales seu plaustri magnitudine. And Strabo, Lib. 3. Geog. affirms, in exterioribus locis augmentur supra minarum octoginta: whose Authorities I shall not contradict, altho' neither by the Observations of the Worthy Mr. Ray, nor any other Modern Author, can I find any to acquire near that Signets. Yet to find very large *Eels*, notwithstanding what is said both by *Pliny* and *Solinus*, of those found in the Gauges Thirty Foot long, is that which is rare and seldom (in England at least wise) to be found, and therefore having lately met with Relations of Two very large *Eels* cought upon the Coast of *Essex*, I thought the Communication thereof to the Curious, would not be altogether unacceptable. These both had all the Characterizing Notes of the *Eel*, and wanted those Barbles which the *Eel* sometimes hath not, but the *Conger* is never without. The First was taken somewhere about *Cricksea*, and for its rarity was made a present of to a Noble Peer of this Realm: Its Length from Tip of the Nose to Tail's End, was Five Foot Eight Inches, and In Circumference it was Two and Twenty Inches; but as for the Weight, no Persons could inform me what it was, tho' perhaps it might not exceed Twenty Pound, of which *Aldrovandus* saith, that in *Italy* they come up to, but never exceed it. And for Length it agrees with those mentioned by *Rondeletius* to be sometimes caught in the Lake of *Latera*, which were Three or four Cubits long. But those were far exceeded by one lately caught in Maldon Channel, about a Mile below the Town, the length of which was Seven Foot, the Circumference Seven and Twenty Inches, the Weight Six and Thirty Pounds, and out of its Belly was taken Five Pounds of Fat, its Skin was Black, and being stuff, is still preserved at Maldon, for the Inspection of the Curious. This Fish was supposed to have been brought down thither by the Great Floods at the breaking of the last Frost, because of a Hurt it had on its Back, which the Fisherman which caught it told me, he did conjecture it might be from some Mill it must pass through. Had it been my good Fortune to have had the Knowledge of this monstrous Eel soon enough, I would have gone over to Maldon, to have seen it opened, it being a fit Subject in which to have examin'd the Parts of Generation, so much controverted, not only by the Ancient, but also by Modern Authors, and thereby been in some measure capacitated to have satisfied my self concerning that no less controverted Point, the Manner of their Generation. Many there are, that with Aristotle, will have the Generation of Eels to be Spontaneous or Equivocal, and will not allow them the Distinction of Sex; the Difficulty how Eels should come to be in any Pool, Pond, Mote or Ditch, in which never any were put, they are not able to surmount, and therefore have vainly imagined them either to be produced from Mud, or from a peculiar Sort of Dew, falling in May or June, upon the Blades of the Grass, whereof Turfs being cut, and the Grass Sides being together, and then laid laid on the warmest Side of a well promising Pool or Pond, the Sun's Heat will thence hatch them; of which Original Myllius, in his Treatise de Origine Animalium, lib. 10. and Morbofius de Metallorum transmutatione, p. 38, 39. seem so well satisfied, that they give the Process of this Affair, as practised by the Dutch, successfully to stock their Fish-ponds with that sort of Fish. That the Generation of any Animal cannot be Equivocal or Spontaneous, but from Animal Parents, hath been so well, by many undeniable Arguments asserted, and by multiplied Experiments confirmed, by those famous and celebrated Virtuosi, Malpighius, Redi, Swammerdam, Leeuwenhoeck, Mr. Ray, and others, in their several learned and ingenious Tracts and Observations on that Subject, that I think there is no room left in the least to doubt but that Eels have the same Original. And if we may credit what the ingenious Dr. Plot, in his Natural History of Staffordshire, p. 243. writes, concerning the Night Travels of Eels observed near Bilston in that Country, by Mr. Mosely, the Way of their stocking Ponds, &c. may not be altogether so improbable neither, as at first it may be thought to be, if we but consider how long they will live out of Water, and though I cannot with Pliny, in his Natural History, Lib. 9. Cap. 21. allow the time to be Six Days, yet I am sure it may be long enough, to travel over a few short Meadows, or from one Ditch or Pond to another, which may be performed in much less time than that of one Night; and if we may believe what Gesner in his Book of Fishes, lib. 4. cap. de Anguilla, quotes from Albertus, of a Parcel of Eels, which in a very cold Winter, Anno 1125. not only left their Natural tural Element, but were found in a dry Meadow, beded together in a Hay-stack, the thing will seem more probable, to which let me add the Form and Shape of their Bodies, which by its undulate or Serpentine Motion is adapted to travel in arido: Neither are Eels the only Fish, which by Authors are affirmed to live in Sicco, but the Exocetus also mentioned by Rondeletius, with others so considerable for their Number, that Theophrastus Eresius wrote a Book of them, which was afterwards Commented upon by Aurelius Severinus, in a Book entituled De Piscibus in sicco viventibus, Printed at Naples, Anno 1655. Not to mention the Cerian and Paphlagonian Fishes, affirmed by Aristotle to wander up and down on the dry Sands, and then return back to Sea again, the like is also asserted of those of the River Cherati, in Judæa, by Geo. Pictorius. All which, Rondeletius thinks Eels, as well as the aforesaid Fishes, perform by the Rima of their Gills, being narrow and thereby capacitated to oppose the free, and too sudden Appulses of the Air. Neither doth the Controversy here terminate, for even among those learned Persons which oppose an Equivocal or Spontaneous Generation, the Dispute is, Whether Eels have distinct Sex, or are Hermophrodites. By some a distinct Sex is allowed them, for Mr. Allen, in his Account of the Generation of Eels, Published in the Philosophical Transactions, Numb. 231. affirms the Parts distinguishing the Sex to be discoverable, and in this Rondeletius is positive, when he affirms, Anguillas mutuo corporum complexu coeuntes se vidisse neque putare se partibus ad gignendum necessariis prorsus destitutas esse, inferiore enim ventris parte, & Vultua in Feminis & semen in Maribus reperitur: sed pinguidine pinguidine multa circumfusa he partes non apparent: And from hence, I mean from the parts of Generation being hid in Fat, might arise that mistake in Aristotle, which did occasion him so positively to affirm, Anguillam neque marem esse neque feminam. And though it cannot but be granted, that that ingenious Inspector of Nature, Mr. Lewenhoek, hath, by the Help of his Glasses (which are very good ones) made many curious Discoveries in Animals and their Parts of Generation, yet never (to use his own Words) had he found a Male Eel that he could call so; for all those that he did Dissect, as in his Letter Published in the Philosophical Transactions, Numb. 221. he declares were provided with an Uterus, from whence he doth conjecture Eels to be Hermaphrodites, and besides the Uterus to be provided with Masculine Seed. Another great Controversy about the Generation of Eels is, whether they are Oviparous or Viviparous, and many ingenious Persons I find there are, which cannot consent to an Equivocal or Spontaneous Generation, but strenuously oppose the same, yet firmly believe them to be Oviparous, whose Sentiments are contrary to the Observations of Walter Chartwynd, Esq; who in the Month of May, found them to be Viviparous, by cutting open the red Fundaments of the Females, from whence the Young Eels would issue forth alive: And although Mr. Allen affirms them to be certainly Viviparous yet his Observations concerning the Place of their Conception, I cannot conceive to be consonant to that Care and Industry of Nature, in providing convenient Receptacles for preserving the Fetus, neither is it agreeable to Reason, to believe, that when Nature hath provided a Uterus in all Animals, not only the Vivipa- rous, and such as only cherish the Embryo in Utero, but in the Oviparous also, and Insects, the Eel and Xiphia or Sword-Fish, mentioned by Bartholinus Cent. 2. H. 16. Anno 1654. should be the only Animals without it, much less that the Guts, appointed by Nature for the Secretion of Nourishment, and the Expulsion of the Faeces, and are always in Motion, should be the Place of Generation in any Animal; though we may allow Eels not to feed Gross in the Winter. On the contrary, that the Eel hath an Uterus, is asserted by Mr. Leewenhoeck, who never found them without; which perhaps is that part which Mr. Allen names a slender Gland, transversely lying near the Bowel. Besides, Nature having in all Animals, Oviparous, as well as Viviparous hitherto dissected, provided not only an Uterus, but also Tubes (first observed by Fallopianus) for the conveying the Ovum from the Ovaria to the Uterus. Another great Difficulty and Objection that lieth against Mr. Allen's Observations, and in which indeed he seems to contradict himself, is this, whereas he saith that in one Eel he found Eggs, and those on the out side of the Intestine; but in the other, Six Young ones, each fastened to a small Placenta, and those within the great Intestine, called, the Strait Bowel, which adjoins immediately to the Pylorus: How and by what Passages those Eggs came into the Intestine, to be formed and invigorated, unless we may suppose they do, like the Embryo's of some sorts of Insects, which for the Convenience of Food, eat their own Way into their Heterogenous, or assumed Matrices. These These Objections I have proposed to be considered only that I might excite that Ingenious Person to perfect his Discoveries, and by ocular Demonstrations to convince the Curious of the Truth and Certainty of his Observations; and finally to terminate this long continued Controversy, concerning the Generation of Eels, and after what manner their Coitus must be performed; the Parts of Generation in the Male, being by him affirmed, to be affixt to the Extremity of the Kidney, and the Embrios in the Female, (as is before observed) found in that Bowel which adjoyns to the Pylorus. IX. An