NATURAL HISTORY 
LETTER XVIII. 
TO THE SAME. 
DEAR SIR, Selborne, July a?, 176S. 
I RECEIVED your obliging and communicative letter of yune the 
28th, while I was on a vifit at a gentleman's houfe, where I had 
neither books to turn to, nor leifure to fit down, to return you an 
anfwer to many queries, which I wanted to refolve in the beft 
manner that I am able. 
A perfon, by my order, has fearched our brooks, but could 
find no fuch fifh as the gajlerojleus pungitius : he found the 
gqfterojleus aculeatus in plenty. This morning, in a bafket, I 
packed a little earthen pot full of wet mofs, and in it fome ftickle- 
backs, male and female ; the females big with fpawn : fome 
lamperns; fome bulls heads; but I could procure no minnows.. 
This baiket will be in Fleet-Jlreet by eight this evening ; fo I 
hope Mazel will have them frefli and fair to-morrow morning. I 
gave fome diredtions, in a letter, to what particulars the engraver 
Ihould be attentive. 
Finding, while I was on a vifit, that I was within a reafonable 
diftance of Ambrejbury, I fent a fervant over to that town, and 
procured feveral living fpecimens of loaches, which he brought, 
fafe and brilk, in a glafs decanter. They were taken in the gul- 
lies that were cut for watering the meadows. From thefe fiihes 
(which meafured from two to four inches in length) I took the 
following defcription : " The loach, in it's general afped, has 
a pellucid appearance : it's back is mottled with irregular 
coUedtions of fmall black dots^ not reaching much below the 
lined 
