150 DE. EMBLETON ON THE VENDACE. 



besides the Yendace, such as Trout, Dace, Bream, Pike, and so 

 on, in the waters of Lochmaben, and there are the same in the 

 lakes of Cumberland and Westmorland, so that the delicate but 

 swift swimming Vendace has little protection for himself, his 

 spawn, and his young broods, and will gradually tend towards 

 extinction. Indeed, Mr. Bowe wrote from Keswick, in 1872, 

 to the effect, that our fish is rare in Derwentwatcr, and that 

 those they do find are mostly bitten by Pike. He had only 

 caught one with fly, and a friend of his another with worm, but 

 that about thirty years ago some men caught about sixty with a 

 net near Lodore : now the fishers get one or two in some years, 

 and in others none. 



Mr. Atkinson informs me that it was generally believed in 

 Dumfriesshire that the Yendace is found in only two of the many 

 lochs at Lochmaben, viz., the Castle Loch and the Mill Loch, 

 that it had become scarce, only five having been taken in 1865, 

 eighteen in 1866, and sixteen in 1867, that it is fished for with 

 a net, and on one day only in August (Knox says July) ; also, 

 that its decrease in numbers is attributed, not to the Yendace 

 Club, but to the drainage of the lochs which has been going on 

 for many years, and has reduced their depth several feet, thus 

 diminishing the feeding ground of the fish by many acres. 



As therefore the Yendace is becoming more rare, and may in 

 a few more years go the way of the Great Auk, it may be as 

 well to put on record the characters of the specimens we possess. 



The internal anatomy was once exhibited by Dr. Knox in a 

 series of preparations kept in his museum, and these may possi- 

 bly still exist in some Edinburgh collection, but I have not seen 

 them. In the works of Bloch, Yarrell, Jenyns, Couch, and 

 others, we look in vain for any description of the internal parts. 



External Characters. — The dried specimens in our Museum 

 have been compared, as far as practicable, with our fresh speci- 

 mens. The measurements are here given in a tabular form, 

 and were taken with the aid of Mr. John Hancock, whose accu- 

 racy in such matters is well known. 



