DANIEL’S RURAL SPORTS. 
scriptive detail, by intermingling with it 
numerous amusing and well authenticat- 
edanecdotes. Thefollowing account of ' 
the tench will, we are confident, be equal- 
ly acceptable to the naturalist, the epi- 
cure, and the lover of wonders. 
<* The tench does not commonly exceed 
four or five pounds in weight: Mr. Pennant 
says he has heard of one that weighed ten, 
and Salvianus speaks to some that weighed 
twenty pounds: it is thick in proportion to 
the length; the scales are very stall and co- 
vered with slime; the eyes are large, and ofa 
gold colour; the irides are red; he is leather- 
mouthed, and sometimes there is a small barb 
at each corner of the mouth; the colour of 
the back is dusky, and dorsal and ventral fins 
of the same hue, and those of the male much 
Dear than those of the female; the head, 
: sides, and ear of a greenish cast, mostbeau- 
tifully mixed with gold (especially those 
taken in rivers) which is in its greatest splen- 
dour when the fish is most in season; the 
tail is quite even at the end, and very broad. 
*« The tench loves still waters, and their 
haunts in rivers are chiefly among weeds, and 
in places well shaded bas bushes or rushes ; 
but they thrive best in standing waters, 
where they lie under weeds, near sluices, and 
at pond heads; they are much more nume- 
rous in pools and pits than in rivers, although 
those taken in the latter are far preferable; 
they begin to spawn in June, and may be 
found spawning in some ywaters till Septem- 
ber ; their best season is from that period til 
the end of May.” 
2 * * * * 
<< Tench are said to love foul and weedy more 
’ than clear water, but situation does not al- 
ways influence their taste; the compiler has 
taken tench eut of Munden-hall Fleet, in 
Essex, belonging to Mr. Western, which was 
so thick with weeds, that the flews could 
be hardly sunk through them, and where the 
mud was intolerably foetid, and had dyed the 
fish of its own colour, which was that of ink, 
yet no tench could be better grown, or of a 
sweeter flavour; many were taken that weigh- 
ed nine, and some ten pounds the brace; 
and the skull and back bone of one preseryed 
at the Hall, which was found dead by the 
side of the water, when compared in length 
to any of those beforementioned, must have 
neatly doubled its weight. In a pond at 
Leigh’s Priory, the compiler caught a quan- 
tity of tench weighing about three pounds 
each, of a colour the most clear and beauti- 
ful: butavhen some of them were dressed 
and brought to table, they smelt and tasted 
so rankly of a peculiar weed, that no one 
could eat them; some that were conveyed 
alive, and put into other water, soon recover- 
ed themselves from this obnoxious taint ; an 
experiment that will always auswer in this 
kind of fish, where it is suspected that there 
851 
is a necessity for cleansing them; and the 
above circumstance is recited to shew, that 
no decisive judgment can be formed from the 
external appearance of the tench, however 
prepossessing it may appear. 
«¢ The tench that has occasioned most 
animadversion, is that which the engraving 
represents; the unusual size and form are 
alike impossible to be accounted for; its bull 
perhaps exceeds that of any one ever known 
to be an inhabitant of the most extensive wa- 
ters of this country, and the shape, which 
seems to have accommodated itself to the 
scanty space allotted for its residence, toge- 
ther stamp ita lusus nature. Its history is, 
that a piece of water, at Thornville-royal, 
Yorkshire, which had been ordered to be 
filled up, and wherein wood, rubbish, &e. 
had been thrown for years, was in November 
1801 directed to be cleared out. Persons were 
accordingly employed, and almost choaked up 
by weeds and eats so little water remained, 
that no person expected to see any fish, ex- 
cept a few eels; yet nearly two hundred brace 
of tench, ofall sizes,and as many perch, were 
found. After the pond was thought to be 
quite free, under some roots there seemed to 
be an animal, which was conjectured to be 
an otter; the place was surrounded, and on 
opening an. entrance among the roots, a 
tench was found of most singular form, hav- 
ing literally assumed the shape of the hole, 
in which he had of course for many years 
been confined. His length from fork to eye 
was two feet nine inches , his circumference, 
almost to the tail, was two feet three inches; 
his weight eleven pounds nine ounces and a 
quarter; the colour was also singular, his 
belly being that of a char, or a vermillion. 
This extraordinary fish, after having been in- 
spected by many gentlemen, was carefully 
put into a pond; but either from confine- 
ment, age, or bulk, it at first merely floated, 
and at last with difficulty swam gently away. 
It is now alive and well.” ; 
For the gratification of another class of 
readers, we shall select a shorter article. 
«¢ In this country many acres of swampy, 
moorish grounds, producing little feed for 
cattle, and, in the present state, a trifling 
rent, might be profitably converted into fish- 
ponds, particularly within thirty or forty 
miles of the metropolis. An acre of water, 
after being two years stocked, will annually 
yield two hundred carp, and one hundred 
tench, that will sell upon the spot to the Lon- 
don fishmongers at a shilling each; an in- 
come to be obtained from no other produce 
to which such sort of land can be appropri- 
ated.” 
The last part of this work is devoted 
to the pleasures of the gun, as far as they 
have for their object the pursuit of the 
feathered tribes ; for, we believe, our au- 
thor would esteem it a sin, little inferior, 
312 
