THE EEL. 69 



times out of ten these sorts of small fish are far preferable, 

 in point of sweetness and flavour, to the larger ones ; but 

 the cooks uniformly run them down, because they are 

 troublesome to prepare for the frying-pan. 



lEel H'&nguille. 



Few fish are better known than the EEL. He frequents 

 all the rivers and waters of Europe, where the cold is not 

 too severe; and he is to be met with on the most sump- 

 tuous as well as on the most frugal tables, the food alike 

 of the rich and the poor. But common, and apparently 

 well-known as he is, no fish has been the subject of more 

 absurd errors, ridiculous prejudices, and puerile conceits. 



The haunts of this fish are familiar to every angler. 

 He inhabits all kinds of waters, ponds, lakes, ditches, 

 trout-streams, rivers. No water is too dirty for him, and 

 none too pure. He thrives in the muddiest holes, and 

 grows fat among the stones of the mountain torrent. A 

 fresh-water fish in all his habits, yet if he gets into the 

 salt-water, he shows little anxiety to leave it again; and 

 though it evidently affects his colour, he grows pro- 

 digiously in it, and gets as fat as butter. No matter 

 where he may be fishing with a sunk bait, the experi- 

 enced angler is never surprised when he pulls out an eel. 

 In short this fish is almost universal, and his attachment 

 to one place rather than another, is highly problematical. 

 Wherever he can get food, there he is; nay, indeed, he 

 has been sometimes found in situations, where, to all 

 appearance, he could get none. 



Various have been the opinions about the mode in 

 which eels are generated. Writers on fishing, one after 

 another, recapitulate the old opinions, and nearly in the 

 same words. We are told that one ancient author supposed 



