CYPRINID^ OK CARP,S. 273 



frequents the same localities — 'lubricus, et spina no- 

 cuus non gobius ulla:' unless he refers here to the sea 

 gudgeoUj as Synesius certainly does where he says, that 

 along the African coast men take mursenas and crabs, 

 but mere urchins, fjuetpaKia, angle for julis and smooth 

 gobies, Kco^iov^ evre\el<{. To enjoy which of tTiese two 

 delicacies it was that Ptolemy invited over to Egypt the 

 parasite Archephon frorn. Attica is uncertain ; not so, 

 however, that this bon-vivant went, and was offered 

 there at supper a portion of a small dish of these deli- 

 cacies, which he let pass without taking any. Conduct 

 so strange and unexpected made Ptolemy first stare, and 

 then mutter to his confidant that he must have invited 

 either a blind or an insane man to his table. Where- 

 upon Alcanor good-naturedly put the guest's abstinence 

 in a new and more favourable light, by attributing it en- 

 tirely to modesty : ' He saw it, sire, but deemed himself 

 unworthy to lay profane hands upon so divine a little 

 fish.' 



Galen speaks in no measured terms of the excellence 

 of the gudgeon, declaring it to rank very high amongst 

 the finny tribe ; not for the mere pleasure of eating it, 

 but for the satisfaction attending its easy digestion. The 

 moderns coincide with the ancients respecting the whole- 

 someness of this fish, though it is now never seen at a 

 dinner-party, unless, perhaps, at some Thames-side villa, 

 where stiU, in imitation of Pope — 



A1t,]imiprTi no turbots dignify ricli boards, 



Axe gudgeons, flounders, what tlie Tkamea afibrds. 



In this small section the females outnumber the 

 males by six to one, an excess which allows each gobius 

 mas to keep a harem. We read in Athenseus of a cer- 

 tain Greek lady whose sweetheart's name was Goby, 

 epaarr/'i rjv airrj^ Ka>^i6<; Tt? ovofia; but whether he 



N 3 



