FISHES AND FISHING. 79 



water there are bream and pure roach, and within 

 these few years there have appeared thousands of fish 

 which partake of the characters of each of those pure 

 species, and it is the same with other large waters 

 with which I am acquainted. I have been informed, 

 lately, that a person was seen to turn loose two or 

 three small jack into the Serpentine, so probably some 

 years hence another monster pike may be taken there, 

 as plenty of gudgeons and myriads of these hybrids 

 will serve him for food. 



ISTow as the above, upon the authority of Dr. 

 Pallas, proves that hybrid birds, which have sexual 

 contact do breed amongst themselves, or with other 

 species of fowls, there can be no doubt that fishes, 

 which can be bred without sexual contact of the pa- 

 rents (as in artificial breeding), may and do produce 

 hybrids, and that those hybrids produce progeny like 

 themselves. Plants and flowers are, many of them, 

 a mixture of two distinct species ; amongst many 

 curious specimens are to be found the plant whose 

 flower or seed is a perfect resemblance of a small snail, 

 and another producing a crop of caterpillars. Do we 

 not cross the breed of dogs ? and those cross breeds 

 have progeny ? To revert again to aqueous animals, 

 look at Willoughby's folio Latin work on fishes ;' the 

 varieties in the numerous plates, prove there are an 

 immense number of hybrid fishes, and the recent 

 work on apodal fish demonstrates the same fact. 



