THE CHARRS. 295 



which, by a friend of the author, Mr. Templeton, is declared to be the 

 8. alpinus. As the description does not give any specific character, we 

 are left in doubt about the correctness of the determination. It is pro- 

 bable that the whiting of Lough Neagh is now extinct. 



Thompson says that, when visiting Lough Neagh in 1843, he was 

 assured by the fishermen that they had not known of any of these 

 whiting being taken from the lake for at least ten years previously. This 

 is confirmed by Mr. Patterson, of Belfast, in a letter addressed to Dr. 

 Giinther, in which he states that the "Charr is believed to have been 

 extinct in that lake for more than thirty years." Therefore, the ques- 

 tion whether the whiting of Lough Neagh was identical with one of 

 the other species, or whether it was a distinct species, will remain un- 

 solved. 



In 1834, Agassiz, being engaged in the examination of some of the 

 continental salmonidce, and having compared them with those of Great 

 Britain, declared at the meeting of the British Association of that year 

 that the charrs of England and Ireland, the ombre chevalier of the Lake 

 of Geneva, and all the different charr-like fishes of Sweden, Switzerland, 

 and all the southern parts of Germany, were one and the same species, 

 or, in other words, that the 8. umbla, 8. salvelinus, 8. alpinus, and 

 8. salmonica, were merely synonymous ; but Dr. Giinther says he cannot 

 " arrive at the same conclusion as Agassiz with] regard to the British 

 charrs known to me.' ' 



By the colours alone fresh specimens of 8. salvelinus, 8. umbla, and 

 8. Willoughbii, may be always distinguished. 



Jenyns, in 1835, adopts only a part of the views advocated by Agassiz, 

 distinguishing 8. umbla and 8. salvelinus. With regard to the former, 

 whence the specimens were obtained is not stated. Mr. Jenyns describes 

 his second species as the torgoch, and calls it 8. salvelinus. 



The view of Agassiz was eventually supported by the late Mr. W. 

 Thompson, of Belfast, who, having had an opportunity of examining the 

 charrs of Windermere, Loch Greenock, Lough Melvin, and of nine other 

 lakes in Scotland and Ireland, came to the conclusion that they were but 

 one species one, however, that is subject to extraordinary variety ; but 

 Mr. Thompson has not brought forward any other proof of this asser- 

 tion that the differences presented by the charr from various localities 

 are very manifold. The following appeared to him to be the most 

 striking differences : 



(1) In specimens from Loch Greenock the male fish has the colour of 

 8. salvelinus (Donovan), the female those of 8. alpinus (Donovan). 

 The male has a much larger head and larger fins than the female. 

 Number of ova, 500. 



