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The sale of the fish ponds of Irrius yielded the 

 same price. Caesar applied to this Irrius, upon 

 some remarkable occasion, to sell him lampreys: 

 this, however, was refused ; but, according to 

 Pliny, six thousand were borrowed from him. In 

 no article of food were these luxurious people 

 more profuse than in fish ; and immense sums 

 of money were frequently given for them. In 

 the reign of Tiberius, two hundred and fifty 

 pounds sterling were given for three mullets, 

 which were brought alive to the dining-room by 

 canals of salt water, running under the table up- 

 on which they were cooked in the presence of 

 those who were to feast upon them. Hortensius 

 was more careful of his lampreys than of his 

 slaves. Crassus, the orator, went into mourn- 

 ing for some he had lost ; and Vedius Pollio, 

 more than once threw in living men to be de- 

 voured by them ! 



In contemplating the geographical distribution 

 of fishes, we recognize at once the great law 

 which binds all created beings, with the excep- 

 tion of man munificently set lord over all viz. 

 that certain species only shall inhabit certain 

 portions of the globe. What a diversity do we 

 observe in the form and organization of fishes, 

 according as they are destined to frequent the 

 rocky coast, the long declivity of the sandy beach, 

 the mud of the river's mouth, the confined chan- 

 nel of the archipelago, the polar ice, or the tro- 

 pical sea ! Nature, in dispensing her creatures 

 over the surface of this great globe, seems to 



