CHUB. 45 



the west of England; and if any attempt has been made to 

 introduce it into these districts — of which, however, we have 

 not received any information — it has not been successful. Nor 

 indeed, except for curiosity, is its conveyance likely to be 

 attempted; for the Chub does not possess a reputation as food 

 that is likely to induce any one to venture the task. The 

 Roman poet Ausonius in a few verses bestows on it this 

 character of being little worth, when he says: — 



"In weedy sands the scale-clad Chub delights; 

 Its sides thick-studded with sharp reed-like bones, 

 Nor can we keep its flesh beyond six hours : 



in which last particular we must offer a correction to what 

 by a slip of the pen was advanced when speaking of the Grey 

 Mullet. It is the Chub and not the Mullet, that in the poetry 

 of Ausonius bears the name of Capito. The most esteemed 

 portion of this fish was supposed to be the head, the stoutness 

 or thickness of the sides of which appear to have given occasion 

 to the name, as well perhaps in the English as in the Latin 

 language. This fish is met with in many portions of the continent 

 of Europe, and so far north as Sweden and a portion of Finland; 

 but it is not a native of Ireland. 



The Chub, like the generality of the Carps, feeds much on 

 vegetables; but it also eagerly devours insects, and readily takes 

 the hook when baited with a worm or molluscous animal; but 

 the method of angling for it, as well as of cooking it when 

 caught, will be found at large in the work of Izaak Walton. 

 This, however, to a small extent, we prefer to give as recorded 

 in the less common Book of St. Albans: — "The Chevyn is a 

 stately fysshe; and his heed is a deyty morsell. There is noo 

 fysshe so strongly enarmyed wyth scalys on the body. And 

 bicause he is a stronge byter he hath the more baytes, which 

 ben thyse." We need not specify the whole of these, as they 

 are varied through the year; but a sample of them may be 

 seen in the ""^yonge frogshys the three fete kitte of by the 

 body [a young frog having its three feet cut off close to the body,] 

 and the fourth close to the knee." 



The time of spawning is early in the summer. 



The example described, which was obtained from Yorkshire, 

 was in length fourteen inches, and in depth in a straight line 



