114 PEOSE HALIETJTICS. 



the German sawrfre, pike-perch, one of the best-flavoured 

 of the family ; the lates nobilis of the erudite, somewhat 

 freely rendered 'cock-up fish' by the Bengalese; the 

 giant of his genus, the true lates antiquorum, or per ca 

 nilotica ; and at the other end of the scale, the group of 

 diminutive perchlings, with transparent bodies, called 

 ambassis ;* the stingiag weever — ^trachiai (otter-pike of 

 Pennant), together with the hideous, hare-lipped urano- 

 scopus, the size of whose gall-bladder, and the singular 

 position of whose eyes, attracted early the attention of 

 naturalists, are aU percidse. Of this short list a much 

 shorter selection must content us for the present ; and, 

 beginning with everybody's acquaintance, the river-perch, 

 we shall next say a few words concerning one or two 

 others of the more remarkable fish enumerated in the 

 above aper9u. 



The perch comes of very ancient stock, and may boast 

 of having estabhshed himself in almost every country of 

 the known world without ever changing his name. Prom 

 the Greek Tripicr) of Aristotle, are derived all the present 

 European appellatives. The first meaning of the word 

 vepKo^, as an adjective, is that dark blue which olives 

 and grapes assume on ripening ; irepKvb'; is also the pro- 

 per name of some species of eagle, so denominated by 

 Homer from its dark plumage ; and as applied to the 

 perch it may indicate the sable bands which bar his 

 back. But the vagueness of all adjectives of colour in 

 ancient authors is notoriously great. Who, for instance, 

 can ever know how much of grey and how much of green 

 went to make up the glaucomatic hue of Minerva's iris ; 

 to what wines, however deep, the term otvoira ttovtov, 

 an epithet of the sea, could possibly apply ; or, in Latin, 

 of what hue the wings of Horace's olor may have been, 



* One of these, the A. Cominersom, occurs in ponds of the 

 Isle of Bourbon, and is salted and cured after the manner of an- 

 chovies. 



