54 ERITISH FRESH-WATER FISHES 
found in such trifling becks and rivulets as serve to shelter 
a true riverine fish like the trout. In fact, if you want to 
define the true home of any animal, find out where that animal 
is reared. The true home of the eel is in the sea, for it is 
in the sea that the young eels are hatched ; that of the salmon 
is running fresh water, for there alone can it reproduce its 
species. The true home, therefore, of the perch being still 
water, it is only in a wide expanse of the same that you can 
observe the natural habits of that fish. In no river, probably, 
could the performance be equalled which is recorded by the 
Rev. Richard Lubbock, namely, the capture of eighteen perch, 
in one of the Norfolk Broads, at a single fishing, and with- 
out moving the punt, not one of which weighed less than 
two pounds.* 
The perch can only spawn in still water, or in a very 
gentle current. The operation takes place in the spring 
Reproduce. Months, varying, according to latitude and tempera- 
tion. ture, from March to the end of May. I have 
never witnessed the process, but it has been described as being 
effected by the female rubbing herself against stones, stakes, 
or water-weeds. The eggs as they leave her body receive a 
coating of mucus, and form a tangled skein, sometimes five 
or six feet in length. The late Mr. Francis Francis, a well- 
known writer upon angling, compared these eggs in appearance 
to ropes of tiny seed pearls. 
Nature—that vague abstraction whereof the designing power 
is manifest everywhere, and which we dimly personify in our 
imagination—Nature, | say, adapts all her means to one supreme 
end—reproduction. Provided this be secured, and thereby 
the perpetuation of the species be maintained, she shows her- 
self absolutely indifferent to the fortune or fate of individuals. 
Life, which we have installed in our ethical system as a sacred 
thing, not to be wantonly wasted, she casts about sometimes 
* Observations on the Fauna of Norfolk, by the Rev. Richard Lubbock. 
Norwich, 1845. 
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