58 THE NATURAL HISTORY [LETT. 



LETTER XVIII. 



TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQ. 



I RECEIVED your obliging and communicative letter of June the 

 28th, while I was on a visit at a gentleman's house, where I had 

 neither books to turn to nor leisure to sit down to return you 

 an answer to many queries, which I wanted to resolve in the 

 best manner that I am able. 



A person, by my order, has searched our brooks, but could find 

 no such fish as the Oasterosteus pungitius : he found the Gaster- 

 osteus aculeatus in plenty. This morning, in a basket, I packed 

 a little earthen pot full of wet moss, and in it some sticklebacks, 

 male and female ; the females big with spawn : some lamperns ; 

 some bullheads ; but I could procure no minnows. This basket 

 will be in Fleet Street by eight this evening ; so I hope Mazel J 

 will have them fresh and fair to-morrow morning. I gave some 

 directions in a letter to what particulars the engraver should 

 be attentive. 



Finding, while I was on a visit, that I was within a reasonable 

 distance of Ambresbury, I sent a servant over to that town, and 

 procured several living specimens of loaches, which he brought, 

 safe and brisk, in a glass decanter. They were taken in the 

 gullies that were cut for watering the meadows. From these 

 lishes (which measured from two to four inches in length) I 

 took the following description : " The loach, in its general 

 aspect, has a pellucid appearance ; its back is mottled with irre- 

 gular collections of small black dots, not reaching much below 

 the linea lateralis, as are the back and tail fins : a black line 

 runs from each eye down to the nose ; its belly is of a silvery 

 white ; the upper jaw projects beyond the lower, and is sur- 

 rounded with six feelers, three on each side ; its pectoral fins are 

 large, its ventral much smaller ; the fin behind its anus small ; 



1 Mr. Peter Mazel was the engraver of Pennant's plates. 



