INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 11 



" spiny or prickly-finned," and " soft-finned " fish ; to the 

 former belong the perch and the ruff, and to the latter belong 

 the chub, the carp, the roach, &c., &c. Under these two 

 orders we must range the respective " families " of fish ; 

 there are many, but only three concern us here, namely, the 

 Percidse family, to which belong the perch and the ruff,; 

 the Esocidae family, to which belongs the pike ; and the 

 Cyprinidae, or carp family, to which belong the carp, the 

 barbel, the chub, the roach, the dace, the tench, the bream, 

 the gudgeon, the bleak, and the minnow. 



The structure of fish and their animal organization present 

 endless subjects of interest ; though they live in the water, 

 yet air is as necessary for them as it is for mankind. Says 

 one writer, " Just as our warm red blood is purified and 

 restored to its vital and arterial qualities by air passing 

 through our lungs, so is the cold red blood of fish by passing 

 through their gills ; and as by the process of breathing we 

 extract the oxygen and so vitiate the air, in like manner do 

 fish, taking the water in at their mouths, extract from it the 

 air held in suspension, and pass it out under the gill-covers 

 in a vitiated state. A man submerged in water cannot ex- 

 tract air enough from it ; a fish submerged in distilled water, 

 which is water minus air, can get none at all, and the result 

 is the same in both cases ; and as most anglers know, or 

 should know, a fish drawn down stream is simply drowned, 

 because the water is thus prevented entering its mouth in 

 the usual way and escaping through the gill-covers." This 

 is the reason then, I should suppose, that fish making their 

 way down stream for any distance travel tail first. How 

 admirably, too, are fish formed — their elongate, smooth bodies 

 suiting them exactly to the element in which they live ; and 

 observe the fins, how well they are suited for their various 

 purposes. 



I will just describe these fins, for an angler, or would-be 



