69 



LOACH. 



Cohitis flitviatilis harhatulci, Willoughby; p. 265, Table Q. 8. 

 " harhatula, Linn^us. Ouvier. Block ; PI. 31, f. 3. 



" Donovan; PL 22. 



" ' Fleming; British Animals, p. 189. 



" *' Jenyns; Manual, p. 416. 



* * Yarrell; Br. Fishes, vol. i, p. 427. It 



has been supposed to be the Eedo 

 of the Poet Ausonius. 



The LoacTi is generally distributed throughout the United 

 Kingdom, and over a large part of the continent of Europe, 

 up to the far north of Scandinavia; but it does not appear to 

 exist in wanner countries, although several other species of the 

 same family are known in India. But even among ourselves 

 it does not inhabit all the streams which might be supposed 

 suited to its nature; and whilst a preference is given to clear 

 water which flows with some degree of rapidity, it is most 

 frequently met with in the narrower branches of a river rather 

 than in the wider and deeper stream. It keeps chiefly at the 

 bottom, where it lies concealed beneath a stone, or resting at 

 ease upon it, waiting for prey with the barbs which encircle 

 its mouth extended; and the quick sensibility with which they 

 are endowed, may be judged from the nerves with which they 

 are furnished, and which are of larger size than those which 

 provide the eyes with sight. Soon after these nerves have 

 come from the brain, at about the hindmost corner of the eye, 

 each of them divides into a pair of branches, the lowermost 

 of which proceeds to the corner of the mouth, while the upper 

 goes to the snout, and probably to the barbs. And that the 

 nostrils also are possessed of acute sensibility is proved in that 

 when the experiment has been made, this fish has been seen 

 to have followed its food by the scent, so as to have discovered 



