160 THE NATURALIST IN AUSTRALIA. 
beneath, diversified throughout the back and sides with ultramarine spots of an almost 
sapphire-like intensity. 
Among the Australian members of the Perch family, the Gippsland Perch of 
the Victorian markets, Lates or Percolates colonorum, is worthy of brief mention, on 
account of the excellent sport it will afford, fished for- with rod, line and artificial fly, 
after the manner of the lordly salmon. As its popular name implies, it is specially 
abundant in the fresh-water lakes of Gippsland, Victoria, and their tributary rivers. 
The distribution of the species is, however, tolerably extensive, it frequenting the 
majority of the river estuaries throughout the Victorian, New South Wales, and South 
Australian coasts, and also certain of those on the north coast of Tasmania. In aspect 
and habits of feeding from the surface, the Gippsland Perch suggests points of 
comparison with the English Bass, Labrax lupus, also a percoid, which likewise 
yields good sport with the salmon rod. Lates colonorum grows to a weight of some 
six or seven pounds, and is, in this respect, thrown altogether into the shade by its 
near ally, Lates calcarifer, which is exclusively a denizen of tropical waters. 
This magnificent species, most appropriately designated the Giant Perch, 
frequents the estuaries of all the inter-tropical Australian rivers from the Fitzroy in 
(Queensland around the northern sea-board to the Ashburton in Western Australia. It 
attains to a length of four or five feet, and a weight of over sixty pounds. This fine 
fish, known in India as the Cock-up or Nair-fish, occurs also in China, and has 
been observed by the writer in the Singapore fish market. At Rockhampton and 
Cooktown on the Queensland coast, the Giant Perch is most familiarly known 
by the native name of Barramundi, a title which is rather misleading, it 
being applied indifferently to other large fresh-water fish, including the Lung Fish, 
Ceratodus, and also to Osteoglossum. Some surprise was experienced by the writer 
on hearing the term of Barramundi applied to the fish in the Fitzroy district of 
Western Australia, but the mystery was solved on finding that it had been 
instituted by a recently imported Queensland native. A characteristic photograph 
from life of this Giant Percoid is included in the series of illustrations of Queensland 
fish embodied in the author’s “ Great Barrier” book. 
Next in order to the Perch family, that of the Sea-Breams, Sparide, demands 
brief notice. This also is a most cosmopolitan group, its members being distributed 
throughout the world, and including some half-a-dozen British species. That 
Australian representative of the tribe, however, which above all others is held in 
highest repute, both for sport and on gastronomic grounds, is the so-called Snapper, 
