OF THE BRITISH ISLANDS. 7 



variation ; the characteristic transverse bands may be 

 increased from the more normal one of five or six to as 

 many as eight; in place of being distinct they may combine 

 with each other either superiorly or inferiorly, or they may 

 on the other hand be altogether absent. The American 

 Perch, formerly distinguished by the title of Perca fla- 

 vescens, is now generally recognised to be a variety only of 

 the British and continental species. The only other British 

 freshwater representative of the Perch family is the Pope 

 or Ruff {Acerina cernua), No. 3, a fish corresponding closely 

 in its general form with the Perch, but readily distinguished 

 from it by the confluence of what in the Perch constitutes 

 a first and second dorsal fin, and by its more sombre 

 colouring, which consists usually of a ground tint of yellowish 

 brown, diversified with thickly sprinkled black or dark- 

 brown spots. The Pope is a small fish, rarely exceeding a 

 length of four or five inches ; the example in the Day 

 Collection, (No. 3B.), measuring as much as six inches, 

 being of exceptional dimensions. 



First among the series of fishes belonging to the marine 

 division of the Perch family must be mentioned the Bass or 

 Basse {Labrax lupus), No. 2. The silvery sheen of the 

 scales of this fish, combined with its somewhat salmon-like 

 size and proportions, has won for it in various parts of our 

 coasts the local title of the " White Salmon ; " and as a 

 variety of such noble fish, the prickly dorsal fin having first 

 been carefully removed, it is not unfrequently foisted upon 

 the uninitiated. Its Latin name of lupus or " wolf," which it 

 has inherited from the Romans — its Greek generic title of 

 Labrax also signifying a " sea-wolf " — is presumed to have 

 been conferred upon it with reference to its voracious 

 appetite, and to its habit of congregating in shoals, and 

 hunting down the smaller species of fish upon which it 



