THE ROACH. 297 



pitfall. Why is the roach called the "roach"? Avery 

 good answer to this is because he always has been called 

 the "roach." Our Anglo-Saxon forefathers called him 

 reohha, reohche, heoce ; the Dutch rog, roch; the Danes 

 rokke ; the Swedes, roclm ; the Germans, roche and ruche. 

 This is " good enough ; " and I do not care to go farther 

 afield. 



But I must further ask whence the origin of the saying, 

 " Sound as a roach " ? I do not know that the roach is 

 sounder than any other fish; but I do know that he is 

 subject to more piscine diseases than the majority of 

 them. Dr. Badham, in his Fish Tattle, says that the 

 proverb, " Sound as a roach," has its origin from our 

 friend's " frisky movements, which have caused him to be 

 considered as the fit emblem of robust health." Oh, most 

 learned and most amusing Fish Tattler ! You must be 

 wrong for once ; or are you only having a joke with your 

 readers ? You cannot be really serious ! Your explana- 

 tion is not as " sound as a roach " or " as a bell." It 

 sounds like a bull. You only escape the righteous indig- 

 nation of- all reasonable beings by mentioning in a note 

 another explanation, which refers the proverb to the 

 reputed power of St. Roche miraculously to cure diseases, 

 whence "sound as a roche" by metonymy meant " sound 

 as one of St. Roche's patients," and was afterwards cor- 

 rupted into " sound as a roach." In the older ichthyo- 

 logical works our Leuciscus rutilus was called roche, and 

 it is by no means improbable that the original and true 

 reading of the proverb was " sound as a rock," from the 

 French roche. 



Our Leuciscus, humble fish though he be, is found, like 

 other fish, in heraldry. He honours, or is honoured by. 



