104 Mr Shaw's Experiments and Observations on the Parr, 



for a short distance the interior of the e^g^ originating near two 

 small dark spots not larger at that time than the point of a pin. 

 These two dark spots, however, ultimately turned out to be 

 the eyes of the embryo fish, which was distinctly seen resting 

 against the interior surface of the egg a few days previous to 

 its exclusion. On the 8th April, which makes ninety days im- 

 bedded in the gravel, I found on examination that they were 

 excluded from the egg, which was not the case a day or two 

 previous. The temperature of the water at the time was 43'', 

 the temperature of the water in the river 45°, and the tempera- 

 ture of the atmosphere 39°. On its first exclusion, the little 

 fish has a very singular appearance. The head is large in pro- 

 portion to the body, which is exceedingly small, and measures 

 about Jive-eighths of an inch in length, of a pale blue or peach- 

 blossom colour. But the most singular part of the fish is the 

 appendage of a bag which adheres to the neck or upper part of 

 the belly. It is of a conical shape, the base being attached to 

 the fish. The bag is about two-eighths of an inch in length, of 

 a beautiful transparent red, very much resembling a light red 

 currant, and in consequence of its colour, may be seen at the 

 bottom of the water when the fish itself can with difficulty be 

 perceived. It also presents another singular* appearance, name- 

 ly, a fin or fringe, resembling that of the tail of the tadpole, 

 running from the dorsal and anal fins to the termination of the 

 tail, slightly indented. It does not appear that this little fish 

 leaves the gravel immediately after its exclusion from the egg, 

 but rather that it remains upwards of fifty days more under the 

 gravel with this bag, as a supply of nourishment during that 

 period, on the same principle as the umbilical supplies of other 

 embryo animals. By the end of fifty days, or the SOth May, 

 the bag disappeared, or rather contracted and formed the belly 

 of the fish. The fin or tadpole-like fringe also disappeared by 

 dividing itself into the dorsal, adipose, and anal fins, all of 

 which then became perfectly developed. The little transverse 

 bars, which for a period of two years (as I have shewn by ex- 

 periment) are to characterize it as the parr, have also appeared. 

 Thus, from the 10th January till the end of May, a period of 

 upwards of 140 days, has been required to perfect this fish, and 

 as yet it measures little more than one inch in length, and cor- 



