96 LABRAX. 



Stupid fish, and are easily taken with the rod at 

 various baits — the most successful of which is, 

 however, a Minnow. In streams where they have 

 grown large, they afford tolerable sport ; and, 

 from the shoal feeding in company, many may be 

 taken when it is once discovered. The average 

 size may be stated at from one pound to a pound 

 and a half. Those of three and four pounds are, 

 however, tolerably common ; but the one men- 

 tioned by Pennant, to have been taken in the 

 Serpentine river, of nine pounds, appears to be 

 still the largest upon record.* In some of the 

 Highland lochs, particularly those of Perthshire, 

 they are remarkably fine and abundant. 



Pallas gave the title of Labrax to a race of 

 fishes found in the sea of Kamtschatka, remark- 

 able in having several lateral lines or rows of pores 

 upon the sides ; but Cuvier, thinking the name 

 inapplicable to a fish which was not known to the 

 ancients, has applied it as a subgeneric title in his 

 own arrangement, to the Perca labrax of Linnaeus. 

 This explanation is necessary, lest the present sub- 

 genus should be confounded with that of Pallas, 



• Bloch mentions one taken in Siberia, of which the 

 head alone measured eleven inches in length, and was 

 kept as a curiosity. The weight must have much exceeded 

 those above mentioned. 



