26 THE VENDACE. 



the fish are in their best season between April and Sep- 

 tember. It is not unusual for sea fish to ascend our rivers : 

 the eel, as I have already narrated, spawns in the sea, and the 

 young of that fish ascend to the fresh water, in which they 

 live till they are seized with the migratory instinct. The 

 parentage of the whitebait will be discovered in the sea, and 

 the changes undergone by fish during their growth are so 

 varied and curious that it would be difficult to predict what 

 the little whitebait may turn out to be whiting perhaps ! 

 After being told that the silver eel is the produce of a black 

 beetle, and knowing that a tadpole is an infantile frog, and 

 that the zoea ultimately becomes a crab, we need not wonder 

 if we are some day told that whitebait becomes in time meta- 

 morphosed into some other entirely different fish ! 



Besides whitebait there are other mysterious fish especi- 

 ally in Scotland which are well worthy of being alluded to. 

 An idea prevails in Scotland that the vendace of Lochmaben 

 and the powan of Lochlomond are really herrings forced into 

 fresh water, and slightly altered by the circumstances of a new 

 dwelling-place, change of food, and other causes. One learned 

 person lately ascribed the presence of sea fish in fresh water 

 to the great wave which had at one time passed over the 

 country. But no doubt the real cause is that these peculiar 

 fish were brought to those lakes ages ago by monks or other 

 persons who were adepts in the piscicultural art. 



A brief summary of the chief points in the habits of these 

 mysterious fish may interest the reader. The " vendiss, " as 

 it is locally called, occurs nowhere but in the waters at Loch- 

 maben, in Dumfriesshire ; and it is thought by the general 

 run of the country people to be, like the powan of Lochlomond, 

 a fresh-water herring. The history of this fish is quite 

 unknown, but it is thought to have been introduced into the 

 Castle Loch of Lochmaben in the early monkish times, when 

 it was essential, for the proper observance of church fasts, to 



