240 rNTBODrCTION TO ZOOLOGY. 



price of a house Lamb in February, and a Pickerel, or small 

 Pike, for more than a fat Capon. 



" Pliny considered the Pike as the longest lived, and likely 

 to attain the greatest size of any freshwater fish. Pennant 

 refers to one that was ninety years old ; but G-esner relates 

 that, in the year 1497, a Pike was taken at Hailbrun, in 

 Suabia, with a brazen ring attached to it, on which were 

 tliese words in Greek characters : ' I am the fish which was 

 first of all put into this lake by the hand of the Governor of 

 the Universe, Frederick II., the 5th of October, 1230.' This 

 fish was, therefore, 267 years old, and was said to have 

 weighed 350 lbs. The skeleton, nineteen feet in length, was 

 long preserved at Manheim as a great curiosity in natural 

 history. The lakes of Scotland have produced Pike weighing 

 55 lbs. weight ; and some of the Irish lakes are said to have 

 afforded Pike of 70 lbs. 



Cyprinidce. — The family of the Carp includes the Minnow, 

 the Bleak, the Eudd, the Bream, the Tench, the Gudgeon, 

 and other well-known freshwater fishes. The Golden Carp 

 (Cyprinus auratus) — Gold and Silver-fishes, as they are 

 more generally called — has been originally imported into 

 these countries, but authors are not agreed as to the precise 

 year. The Carp (Cyprinus carpio) itself is also a naturalized 

 species, but introduced at so remote a date that, in the " Boke 

 of St. Albans," printed at Westminster in 1496, it is men- 

 tioned : — " The Carpe is a dayntous fisshe, but there ben but 

 fewe in Englonde." 



The Bream is in such repute on the Continent, that an old 

 French proverb says, " he that hath Bream in his pond is 

 able to bid his friend welcome." And it may be inferred from 

 a couplet in Chaucer's Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, that 

 the feeding and eating of Bream was more in fashion in the 

 days of Edward III. than at the present time — 



" Full many a fair Partrich hadde he in mewe, 

 And many a Breme, and many a Luce * in stewe." 



To one class of our young readers, it may perhaps be more 

 interesting to know that from the silvery-looking scales of this 

 family of fishes, the material is derived for making the gorgeous 

 necklaces of artificial pearl which are so temptingly displa3'ed 

 in the toy-shops. 



♦ Tike. 



I 



