266 Mr. W. Thompson on a new British Fish, 



plants in England has no doubt caused them to be misunder- 

 stood by most of our native botanists, and I feel great plea- 

 sure in being able to give the result of my study of the living 

 plants in the Channel Islands, where they occur in profusion. 

 It appears to me that no two plants can be more truly distinct 

 than this species and its predecessor. 

 St. John's College, Cambridge, Oct. 27, 1838. 



XXXI. — On Fishes ; containing a notice of one Species new to 

 the British, and of others to the Irish Fauna. By William 

 Thompson, Esq., Vice-President of the Natural History 

 Society of Belfast. 

 CoREGONUs CLUPEOiDES, NiUson.? Cuun. — In a letter from 

 the Rev. T. Knox, of Toomavara, dated Jan. 29, 1838, and ac- 

 companying a specimen of a fish procured at my request, was 

 the following observation : '^ We have at last been able to get 

 the little fish mentioned by the fishermen as being found in 

 the Shannon in winter — it was sent from Killaloe. I believe 

 it goes down the river with the eels every winter ; it takes no 

 bait." The Rev. C. Mayne of Killaloe — by whose kind at- 

 tention the specimen was secured — informs me, in reply to 

 some queries, " that it is called a Cunn by the fishermen of that 

 place, who state that it is never taken but in the eel-nets 

 about Christmas, when the ^run of eels' is nearly over, and 

 that they never saw more than seven or eight caught in a 

 year, seldom indeed so many." Killaloe, it should perhaps be 

 stated, is not less than eighty miles from the mouth of the 

 Shannon. In the hope of ascertaining the occurrence of this 

 fish at Portumna, about twenty miles higher up the river, I 

 wrote to a correspondent there, at the same time describing 

 the species, and on the 24th of March last received the fol- 

 lowing reply. " I think it very uncertain whether there is 

 such a fish in the Shannon, but still some old fishermen say 

 there is, and that they are a little smaller than the common 

 herring, but exactly the same shape and colour ;" and he again 

 observes — " after making every inquiry, I learn that about half 

 a dozen white fish like herrings were got in Lough Derg [a 

 mere expansion of the river Shannon] very near this, about 



