THE WHITEBAIT, 139 



brackish, and not as at Woolwich only during 

 high tide, after the influx has arrived at its 

 maximum. 



The whitebait fishing is by means of a fine 

 bag-net, with a mouth of about three feet 

 square ; the boat is moored in the tide way, 

 and the mouth of the net does not dip more 

 than four feet below the surface. 



The delicacy of the whitebait needs no 

 comment. Pennant states it to be dehcious, 

 and says that epicures of the lower order 

 resort to the taverns adjacent to the places 

 Avhere it is taken for the purpose of enjoying 

 it. Mr. Yarrell makes the following comment 

 on Pennant's observations : " What might have 

 been the particular grade of persons who were 

 in the habit of visiting Greenwich to eat white- 

 bait in the days when Pennant wrote, I am 

 unable to state ; but at present the fashion of 

 enjoying the excellent course of fish, as served 

 up either at Greenwich or Blackwall, is sanc- 

 tioned by the highest authorities, from the 

 court at St. James's Palace in the west, to the 

 lord mayor and his court in the east, including 

 the cabinet ministers, and the philosophers of 

 the Royal Society." 



It is to Mr. Yarrell that we owe the discrimi- 

 nation of the true specific distinctness of this fish. 



