Page:The Deipnosophists (Volume 2).djvu/94

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gregarious fish, and that it has a great many things in common with the sepia; such as the same number of feet, and the two proboscises: but of this kind the lower feet are the smaller, and the upper feet the larger; and of the proboscises, that on the right side is the thickest: and the whole body is delicate, and of a more oblong shape than the sepia. And the teuthis also has ink in its mutis, which, however, is not black, but of a pale colour. And its shell is very small, and cartilaginous.

There is also the teuthus; and the only difference between the teuthus and the teuthis is in size: and the teuthus is of the size of three spans; and it is of a reddish colour. And of its two teeth, the lower one is the smallest, and the upper one is the largest; and both of them are black, and like a hawk's beak. And when it is slit open, it has a paunch like a pig's paunch. Aristotle, in the fifth book of his Parts of Animals, says that both the teuthus and the sepia are short-lived fish. And Archestratus, who travelled and sailed over the whole earth, for the sake of gratifying his greedy appetite, says,—

The best of all the teuthides are those
Caught near Pierian Dium, near the stream
Of Baphyras. And in Ambracia's port
You will see mighty shoals of this same fish.

And Alexis, in his Eretrian, introduces a cook speaking in this way—

Teuthides, thornbacks, rays, and fat
Anchovies, lumps of meat, and paunches too.
I took the teuthides, cut off their fins,
Adding a little fat; I then did sprinkle
Some thin shred herbs o'er all for seasoning.

There is also a sort of cake or confectionary called [Greek: teuthis], which is mentioned by Iatrocles, in his book on the Art of making Bread, as Pamphilus quotes.

131. Then there is the sea-pig. Epicharmus, in his Hebe's Wedding, says—

There were hyænides, buglossi,
There was the harp-fish too in numbers.

And he also calls them not only [Greek: hyainides], but also [Greek: hyes] in the following lines—

There were too chalcides and sea-pigs ([Greek: hyes]),
And sea-hawks, and the fat sea-dog.