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II. Descriptions of three British Species of fresh-water Fishes belonging to the 

 Genus Leuciscus of Klein. By William Yarrell, Esq. F.L.S. &; Z.S. 



Read June 19th, 1832. 



Pennant in his published account of a Tour in Scotland and Voyage to 

 the Hebrides, pp. U. and 12, has the following observation.— " In the Mersey 

 near Warrington, and in the river Alt, which runs by Sephton, Lancashire, into 

 the Mersey near Formby, a fish called the Graining is taken, which in some 

 respects resembles the Dace, yet it is a distinct and perhaps new species." 



A short description of this fish, occupying a few lines only, appears in the 

 quarto edition as well as in both octavo editions of the British Zoology ; and 

 the Graining is also characterized by Shaw in the 5th volume of his General 

 Zoology, page 234, as follows : 



" Cyprinus Lancastriensis. Pennant's Graining. 



" C. argenteus, dorso subrecto coemlescente, oculis pinnisque inferioribus 

 rubentibus." 



Notwithstanding these notices, this fish remains comparatively unknown to 

 the present time, and has not, that I am aware, been found in any other 



locality. 



One of the streams which produce the Graining rises in Knowsley Park ; 

 and I have, by the kindness of Lord Stanley, the President of this Society, 

 been most liberally supplied with specimens of this fish, from the examination 

 of which the following particulars have been derived. 



The Graining, though similar to the Dace in shape, is yet distinguished from 

 it by being still more slender in its form. In the Dace the length of the fisli is 

 in proportion to the depth as 4 to 1 : in the Graining these proportions are as 

 5 to 1 ; and there are also other differences to be hereafter noticed. 



The Graining has the top of the head, the back, and upper part of the sides 

 of a pale drab-colour tinged with blueish red, and separated from the lighter- 



