354 PIKE-PERCH FROM RUSSIA. 



days on their journey. After this who will say Zander 

 will not hear transporting ? Henceforth England pos- 

 sesses the celebrated aristocratic choice eating fish, 

 Lucio perca zanclra, or pike-perch, thanks to his Grace 

 the Duke of Bedford. 



" Three previous attempts were made by my friend 

 Alexander Seydell, of Stettin, and self, to procure the 

 Zander from Stettin by sea to London. On the first 

 voyage all the fish died ; the second produced three live 

 small five-inch Zander. They died in Mr. Frank Buck- 

 land's museum at South Kensington, and are now there 

 preserved in spirits. The third voyage nearly proved 

 a shipwreck, as the steamer was thrown on her beam 

 ends, and all the gear on deck, the large Brighton 

 Aquarium iron carrier included, were tossed into the 

 North Sea.— T. E. Sachs." - 



PIKE-PERCH FROM RUSSIA. 



In May, 1880, Mr. Charles, of 9, Lower Grosvenor 

 Place (late Arabella Eow), kindly sent me a fish bought 

 at BilliDgsgate, under the name of *' shaddick," from 

 Russia. I at once saw it was a pike-perch (Perca lucio, 

 Perca). It weighed 81bs. 



I found nine specimens on the slab, and he has 

 been kind enough to give me the heads of all of them. 

 Mr. Pike-perch has a formidable back fin, which, on being 

 dried, I find consists of fourteen rays, the longest of which 

 is nearly three inches. The point of each ray is as sharp 

 as a needle, and the membrane which covers each spine 

 seems to make a retractible sheath for the point. 



The teeth of the pike-perch are indeed most formidable. 



At the tip of the upper and at the tip of the lower jaw 



there are two teeth, conical and exceedingly sharp. 



* Note. — Should another experiment be tried, it should be with 

 fry, not half or full-grown fish. 



