THE PIKE-PERCH. 31 



delicious a fish, it is said, nevertheless, that if partaken of 

 daily, one soon tires of it. In some parts of the country the 

 fat is used by the peasants as an embrocation for the cure of 

 rheumatism, sprains, &c. 



In the Wenern, the spawning season of the gos is April 

 and May. Swedish and Danish naturalists tell us, however, 

 that the process goes on up to the middle of June, and they 

 attribute its long continuance to the circumstance of these 

 fish only spawning in the night. Furthermore, that at this 

 time, the fish leave the deeps and approach the shoals, where 

 the female deposits her roe amongst stones, weeds, &c., " but 

 never," they say (though this seems to me very doubtful), " in 

 less than from sixteen to twenty feet of water." The eggs, 

 which are light in colour, and very small in comparison with 

 the size of the fish, are exceedingly numerous. Bloch, in a 

 female of three pounds weight, found no less than three 

 hundred and eighty thousand six hundred and forty. 



The fry are of rapid growth. Ekstrom speaks of an indi- 

 vidual of seven to eight inches in length, kept in a small piece 

 of water, that he imagined to be about a year old, and which 

 in the course of three years weighed from five to six pounds. 



The gos attains to a large size in the Scandinavian waters. 

 It has, to my knowledge, been occasionally killed in the 

 Wenern exceeding twenty pounds weight ; and we read of 

 one taken in the Lake of Karsholm, in Scania, which weighed 

 twenty-seven pounds. But monsters such as these are 

 exceptions to the rule, the more usual weight of the adult 

 fish being only about ten or twelve pounds. 



The gos is captured in Sweden by devices of various 

 kinds. Near Ronnum great numbers were taken by nets, 

 night lines, &c. At the neighbouring estate of Frugard, 



