THE BREAM, 2gj 



cui'vated like a bow, and nearer to the bellj than the 

 back of the fllli : above, the bream is a blackifti green, 

 the (ides and belly white, with a gilded line when the 

 lifti is in high feafon *. 



Stagnated water, or rivers gently gliding along, are 

 the refidence of this fpecies ; which there feeds wpon 

 herbs, mud, and clay. Its feafon of fpawning is in the 

 month of May j at which period the males are marked 

 upon the head with a number of white tubercles ; an in- 

 cident which P/inj/ takes notice of as befalling the fifties 

 of the Lago di Como in Italy f . 



Similar to the bream is the rud, a fifh frequent in the 

 Rhine, the fens of HolderneJ/e, and in the Charxvell, near 

 Oxford. It is about two pounds weight ; and in feafon, 

 almofl the whole year round, except in the inonth of 

 April, when it fpawns. At this feafon, the head of the 

 male is rough with white tubercles, refembling thofe of 

 the preceding fpecies. The rud is reckoned a fuperior 

 difli to any of this genus. 



The rud feems to be an intermediate fpecies between 

 the carp and the bream ; it is broader than the former, 

 and deeper than the latter fiih. The colour is brown, 

 changing into yellow ; the fins are of a reddiili hue, and 

 the whole body is covered with very large fcales. The 

 opercula of the gills are, for the moft part, marked with a 

 blood coloured fpot. 



lu many of the fifti ponds about London and In the fouth 

 oiEngla?id, there is reared a fifh called the crucian § ; but as 

 it is not mentioned by WUloughby, it is probably not a na- 



VoL. III. P p t\vQ 



* Wlllough, p. 348. f Lib. ix. cap. iS, 



§ Cj-prinus Carafiius, Lin. -''7^. 



