Dace.] 



MUSEUM OF ANIMATED NATURE, 



151 



they would roll about, and rub themselves against 

 the brickwork, and show considerable playfuhiess." 

 The general colour of this fish above is greenish 

 brown, assuming a yellow tinge on the sides, and 

 passing into white beneath ; the sides of the muzzle 

 and the gill-covers are tinged with bronze ; the 

 dorsal and caudal fins are brown, the rest fleshy 

 red. The tail is forked, the muzzle long, the head 

 wedge-shaped ; the upper jaw exceeds the under, 

 which is short ; the upper lip is fleshy, and doubt- 

 less endowed with considerable sensibility, to which 

 probably the barbules contribute. 



2421.— -The Gudgeon 

 {Gobiojluviatilis). Cyprinus Gobio, Linn. 



The genus Gobio has the dorsal fin short, and the 

 angles of the mouth furnished with barbules, but is 

 destitute of the strong serrated bony ray of the dor- 

 sal and last under fin, as seen in the carp. 



This pretty little fish is very common on the Con- 

 tinent and in our island, frequenting clear rivers 

 and streams, where it swims about in shoals, dis- 

 playing considerable alertness. It feeds on worms, 

 aquatic insects and their larvae, small mollusks, &c. 

 In the Thames, the Kennet, the Mersey, and Avon, 

 the gudgeon is particularly abundant ; and to those 

 who like to pull out fish one after another, with the 

 utmost despatch, gudgeon fishing affords excellent 

 sport, for no fish bites more freely, and the small 

 red worm is a captivating bait. 



Small as this fish is, seldom exceeding six or 

 seven inches, its flesh is very delicate, and as weight 

 can be made up by numbers, it forms an excellent 

 dish. In the Thames the fishermen enclose shoals of 

 gudgeons in their casting nets with small meshes, 

 and keep them in their well-boats alive for sale ; and 

 many of the fishmongers preserve them in tanks or 

 cisterns, supplying them with fresh water. 



The breeding time of the gudgeon is in May ; the 

 shoals then seek shallow water, exposed to the sun ; 

 in a short time the young are hatched and may be 

 soon after seen swimming about, near the margm of 

 the stream, in many a mazy curve, and darting away 

 when alarmed into deeper retreats. To the pike, 

 trout, and perch, &c., the gudgeon offers a perpetual 

 repast. 



A detailed description of this fish is needless. 



2422.— The Bream 



{Abramis Brama). In this genus there are neither 

 bony rays nor baibules ; the body is deep and com- 

 pressed, forming an oval outline ; the doreal fin is 

 short, the posterior fin below long. 



The bream is common on the Continent as far 

 north as Norway and Sweden, inhabiting rivers and 

 lakes. In our island it is local. It exists in the 

 Mole, and the Medway, the Trent, and also in other 

 rivers that are slow and deep ; as well as in canals, 

 and extensive ponds, where it is often very abundant. 

 The lakes of Cumberland and Westmoreland, and 

 many of the Irish lakes, abound with bream of a 

 large size, many weighing from ten to fourteen or 

 fifteen pounds. The flesh is not held in much esti- 

 mation, but rt is said to be best in spring and autumn. 

 Formerly, indeed, it appears to have been in high 

 request, and we believe is still esteemed on the Conti- 

 nent, where freshwater fish are more valued than 

 in our island, which enjoys an ample supply of sea- 

 fish, not only around the coast, and in the metropo- 

 lis, but (such is the rapidity of carriage-conveyance) 

 even in the most central counties. 



If we may credit Daniel, bream-fishing must af- 

 ford excellent sport to the angler, as the fish bites 

 eagerly and plays vigorously. He thus describes a 

 day of bream-fishing at New Hall Pond in Essex. 

 "The weather was cloudy, and the wind brisk; 

 there were seven rods used by the party, and very 

 frequently there were bites at them all at the same 

 time When a fish was hooked, and played at the 

 top, or near the surface of the water, numbers were 

 seen to follow him, and so soon as the hooks were 

 fresh baited, were alike greedily taken. Some few 

 perch and tench were caught, but principally bream, 

 which averaged at least two pounds a fish ; and of 

 these, from six in the morning till dark in the even- 

 ing, some hundredweight were taken. The bait 

 used was the large red worm, and the spot had been 

 bnited on the morning and evening previous to the 

 day of fishing ; the ground-bait used, was boiled 

 wheat and tallow-melters' greaves mixed together." 

 The bream herd together in large shoals; in the 

 lakes of Ireland several hundredweight have been 

 taken in a short time; the peasantry split and dry 

 them, and thus preserve them for food. 



The breeding season of this fish is May. 



The general colour of the bream is golden brown ; 

 the cheeks and gill-covers silvery white ; the fins 

 are pale with a tinge of brown, except the pectoral 

 and ventrffi, which are tinted with red ; iris golden 

 yellow. Young fish are of a yellowish white. This 

 »pecie» is often called the carp-bream. An allied 

 •pecies of smaller size, the White Bream, or Bream- 

 flat (Abramis blicca) is found in several of our rivers. 



as the Trent, Cam, and others, and is common in the 

 lakes and rivers of the Continent. It rarely exceeds 

 ten or twelve inches in length, and is of a silvery 

 bluish white, with silvery white irides. It is of 

 little vahie for the table. 



2423.— The Dace 



(Leticiscus vulgaris). In the genus Leuciscus the 

 dorsal and last fin below are short and destitute of 

 spines ; there are no barbules about the lips. The 

 species, termed collectively white-fish, are nume- 

 rous. 



Fig. 2424 shows the Dace (La Vaudoise) in com- 

 parison with the Roach (Leuciscus rutilus), la Rosse 

 of the French. The lower figure is the Dace, the 

 upper the Roach. 



These two fish are common throughout the whole 

 of Europe, and are abundant in our island : especially 

 the roach, which is also more extensively spread on 

 the Continent. In many respects they are alike in 

 their habits, and do not greatly diff'er from each 

 other in appearance. " They be much of a kind," 

 says Walton, "in matter of feeding, cunning, and 

 goodness, and usually in size." The dace, however, 

 is longer and not so broad as the roach, and its fins 

 and eyes have a less brilliant colour, but they have 

 both a handsome silvery appearance. 



Roach prefer deep and quiet rivers, and will breed 

 well in ponds ; but dace love streams deep but clear, 

 with a gentle current, and do not thrive so well in 

 ponds. By day roach haunt deep water in and near 

 beds of weeds, or under the shade of the trees which 

 overhang the banks. Walton terms this fish the 

 " water-sheep, for his simplicity or foolishness ;" but 

 several writers do not coincide with the venerated 

 angler on this point. Roach fishing, indeed, is ex- 

 cellent practice for beginners ; and almost as much 

 quickness and dexterity are required as in fly-fishing. 

 To the more experienced even the fish affords ex- 

 cellent sport : Walton added, " especially the great 

 roaches about London, where I think there be the 

 best roach anglers." Neither roach nor dace are in 

 much estimation for the table. They both make 

 good bait for pike, the dace for his silvery whiteness ; 

 and the roach, being more tenacious of life as well, 

 is used for night-hooks. Roach are in the best con- 

 dition in October, and dace in February, though on 

 this point there are different opinions. Both spawn 

 at the end of May or early in June, and recover 

 their strength in about a fortnight afterwards. Roach 

 ascend the upper parts of the Thames preparatory to 

 spawning ; and vast shoals leave Loch Lomond at 

 the same season, and during three or four days are 

 caught on their migration in large numbers. The 

 dace seldom exceeds nine or ten inches in length, 

 but the roach attains a larger size. Mr. Jesse 

 caught a Thames roach which weighed three 

 pounds. Walton thought one of two pounds wor- 

 thy of special notice. "The Thames, ' he says, "af- 

 fords the largest and fullest in this nation, especially 

 below London Bridge." 



Mr. Yarrell observes that " Mr. Donovan, in his 

 ' History of British Fishes,' says, ' In the River 

 Thames, the finest roach are caught about the 

 middle of May or early in June, when those fish 

 come up in shoals fromthe sea to deposit their spawn 

 in the higher parts of the river.' But the roach in this 

 instance came from the direction only in which the 

 sea lies, not, I apprehend, from the sea itself." The 

 attempt to gain a higher station in the river, 

 where the oxygen is in greater quantity at this sea- 

 son, accounts for the migratory movements of this 

 and other fishes ; but, adds Mr. Yarrell, " I have 

 never known a roach to be taken in the sea into 

 which the fish had entered voluntarily." Montagu, 

 in his MS., referring to Donovan's statement of this 

 migration from the sea, expresses his belief that Mr. 

 Donovan was mistaken, and his conviction that the 

 roach could not exist in sea water at all ; quoting 

 the following fact which came under his own obser- 

 vation. " In a small river that runs into a large piece 

 of water of nearly two miles in extent, close to the 

 sea on the south coast of Devon, there is no outlet 

 but by means of percolation through the shingle 

 that forms a barrier between it and the sea : in this 

 situation roach thrive and multiply beyond all ex- 

 ample. About eight or nine years ago the sea 

 broke its boundary and flowed copiously into the 

 lake at every tide for a considerable time, by which 

 every species of fish were destroyed." The follow- 

 ing account of the alteration which has taken place 

 with respect to the localities of roach and other fish 

 in the river Thames appeared in the 'Penny Maga- 

 zine ' for 1842. It is a very interesting communica- 

 tion. 



"Punt-fishing for roach by the starlings of Old 

 London Bridge was once a common amusement of 

 the city anglers, which they continued to enjoy to 

 the end of the reign of George I. Sir John Haw- 

 kins, in his edition of Walton's ' Angler,' published 

 in 1760, gives an interesting account of their latter- 

 day exploits. 'The Thames,' he says, 'as well 

 above as below bridge, was formerly much resorted 



to by London anglers ; and, which is strange to think 

 on, considering the unpleasantness of tne station, 

 they were used to fish near the starlings of the 

 bridge. This will account for the many fishing- 

 tackle shops that were formerly in Crooked Lane, 

 which leads to the bridge."' In the memory of a 

 person not long since living, a waterman that plied 

 at Essex Stairs, his name John Reeves, got a com- 

 fortable living by attending anglers with his boat: 

 his method was to watch when the shoals of roach 

 came down from the country, and when he had 

 found them, to go round to his customers and give 

 them notice. Sometimes they (the fish) settled op- 

 posite the Temple ; at others at Blackfriars or Queen- 

 hithe ; but most frequently about the chalk hillst 

 near London Bridge. His hire was two shillings a 

 tide. A certain number of persons who were ac- 

 customed thus to employ him, raised a sum suffi- 

 cient to buy him a waterman's coat and silver badge, 

 the impress whereof was ' Himself, with an angler 

 in his boat," and he had annually a new coat to the 

 i time of his death, which might be about the year 

 1730.' In 1760 Shepperton and Hampton were 

 much resorted to by London anglers for roach fish- 

 ing. If the respectable old angler who joyfully put 

 his tackle in order when John Reeves announced a 

 shoal of roach at London Bridge, could now see 

 half a dozen steam-boats at one time moving between 

 Queenhithe and Blackfriars (no unusual sight), he 

 would easily conclude that his sport in that quarter 

 was destroyed. But he would not at once perceive 

 all the other causes which had driven the fish away, 

 such as improved sewers disgorging the impurities 

 of treble the population of the London of his day, 

 the increase in a still larger proportion of manufac- 

 tories, and the establishment of works he never 

 dreamt of, for converting coal into a gas for lighting 

 shops and streets. Turning to one of the Parlia- 

 mentary Reports on the state of the water supplied 

 to the inhabitants from the river, he would learn by 

 the evidence of fishermen, that since 1820, flounders, 

 eels, roach, smelt, salnion, and other fish, had been 

 unable to live in that part of the Thames between 

 Woolwich and Putney. In this Repoif, issued ia 

 1828, Mr. Goldham, the clerk of Billingsgate- 

 market, states that about twenty-five years ago there 

 were four hundred fishermen, each of whom was the 

 owner of a boat and employed a boy, and they ob- 

 tained a good livelihood by the exercise- of their 

 ci aft between Deptfoid and London, taking roach, 

 plaice, smelts, flounders, salmon, shad, eels, gudgeon, 

 dace, dabs, &c. Mr. Goldham states that about 

 1810 he had known instances of as many as ten 

 salmon and three thousand smelts being taken at 

 one haul up the river towards Wandsworth, and fifty 

 thousand smelts were brought daily to Billingsgate, 

 and not fewer than three thousand Thames salmon 

 in the season. Some of the boats earned 6/. 

 a week, and salmon was sold at three shillings and 

 four shillings the pound. The fishery was nearly 

 destroyed at the time when this evidence was given. 

 The masters of the Dutch eel-ships stated before the 

 same committee that a few years before they could 

 bring their li\e eels in ' wells' as far as Gallions' 

 Reach, below Woolwich: but now (1828) they were 

 obliged to stop at Erith, and that they had sustained 

 serious losses from the deleterious quality of the 

 water, which killed the fish. Many other facts 

 might be mentioned to the angler of the old school 

 still more perplexing — of salmon brought from 

 Scotland in ships moved by steam, and in such large 

 quantities as frequently to sell at sixpence and eight- 

 pence the pound ; of the supplies of fish from the 

 coast being conveyed to London in three or four 

 hours by railroads ; and that by these means fresh 

 fish, once the most difficult commodity to put into 

 extensive circulation, was now regularly sold in the 

 markets of most inland parts of the count ly not very 

 many hours after being caught." 



2425.— The Chub 



{Leuciscus ceplialus). In most of our rivers in Eng- 

 land, the chub is common. In some parts of the 

 Thames it is very abundant, preferring deep spots 

 under banks, sheltered by trees, and the tranquil 

 water along the margin of willow-aits, where it 

 shrouds itself from observation. It feeds on worms, 

 insects, and their larvae, and bites eagerly at the 

 chafer-beetle, which forms the most killing bait. 

 The chub seldom acquires a very large size, and 

 specimens of even three and four pounds weight are 

 very raie. The breeding season is from the end of 

 April to the middle of May. The flesh of this 

 species is of inferior quality. The general colour- 

 ing above is bluish black, passing into bluish white 

 on the sides, and silvery beneath. Top of the head 

 blackish brown ; pectoral fins reddish brown ; cau- 

 dal fin dusky ; gills and iris golden yellow. 



As species of the same genus we may enumerate 

 the Ide (L. idus); the Dotjule roach {i,. Dobuia). 

 the Grainins (L. Lancastriensis, Yarrell) ; the Red^ 



• Four persons of this craft still liave sliops in Crooked Lane. 

 -)- The (lopositions from tlie rubble cumposini; the starlings. 



