738 
SCANDINAVIAN FISHES. 
the water inhabited by the dish. It is purest and most 
handsome in lakes with clear water and weedy bottom. 
In such cases the back is olive green, the sides are 
lighter and suffused with brassy yellow, growing still 
lighter towards the belly, which is whitish yellow. The 
top of the head is of a darker olive green than the 
back; its sides are coloured with a handsome brassy 
yellow. In muddy lakes with turbid water the colora- 
tion is darker, the back and the top of the head being 
dark green, the suffused colour on the sides hardly 
visible, and the belly dark yellow. The iris is yellow 
in specimens that live in clear water ; but the darker 
the colour of the body, the greater the density of the 
dark dots with which the iris is punctated, and which 
in these specimens give it a brownish or pure brown 
appearance. The colour of the dins is no less variable. 
It conforms to that of the body, and thus becomes 
darker or lighter. The dorsal and caudal fins are 
generally grayish, and in colour closely resemble the 
back. The pectoral, ventral, and anal fins are more 
reddish brown. During youth, “up to a length of at least 
42 mm.“, the Crucian Carp is marked on the peduncle 
of the tail with a whitish band and, in front of this, 
with a black band, sharply defined posteriorly” (Malm). 
The common Crucian Carp may undergo the same 
change of colour as its nearest congener, the Goldfish. 
Pallas states that the most handsome specimens of this 
golden form occur in the desert lakes along the course 
of the River Ural and in its salt tributary, the So Le- 
na j a. v. Siebold observed a similar, but stunted form 
(of the following variety) in small, stagnant pieces of 
water near Braunsberg and Konigsberg in East Prussia. 
B: The Bond Crucian Carp ( Cyprinus gibelio, Bl., 
auctt.) — Plate XXX, fig. 3. 
In Sweden the Pond Crucian Carp is usually of 
insignificant size. Its ordinary length is about 7 — 12 
cm., while the largest specimen Ekstrom saw measured 
nearly 2 dm. In 1835 Fries took a specimen 23 cm. 
long at Morlanda (Bohuslan); and Malm mentions the 
capture of a female 34 cm. long in the pond at the 
park of the Gothenburg Horticultural Society. 
The body of this variety, as compared with that 
of the preceding one, is more elongated, less compressed 
in front, and shallower. The greatest depth, which lies 
somewhat nearer to the head than in the Lake Crucian , 
Carp, is less than half (about 2 / 5 ) of the length of the 
body to the base of the caudal fin, or about 1 / 3 of the 
length to the end of the said fin. The greatest thick- 
ness is more than 1 / 3 of the greatest depth. 
The shape of the back is the same as in the com- 
mon Crucian Carp. The dorsal profile runs in a re- 
gular and not very high arch, without any angle at 
the beginning of the dorsal fin, and is in general less 
strongly depressed between the end of the dorsal fin 
and the beginning of the caudal fin than in the pre- 
ceding variety. The elevation at the very tip of the 
tail (the urostyle), on the other hand, is sometimes 
more marked in the Pond Crucian Carp. The belly 
from the isthmus to the ventral fins is convex, seldom 
flat as in the preceding variety, and between the ventral 
and anal fins compressed, almost carinated. The curve 
of the ventral profile is nearly equal to or somewhat 
sharper than that of the dorsal, whereas in the common 
Crucian Carp the former is more gradual than the 
latter. From the anal to the caudal fin the depression 
is more distinct. The tail is deep and short, though 
longer than in the preceding variety, the distance be- 
tween the anal fin and the caudal fin being there al- 
most exactly half the depth of the body at the end of 
the former fin, but here 2 / 3 thereof. 
The head is apparently larger — which is always 
the case when the fish acquires a more elongated form 
— but its relative length is really the same as in the 
Lake Crucian Carp, varying between about 27 % (in 
young specimens) and about 22 % (in old) of the length 
of the body. Its breadth, however, measured across 
the gill-covers, is greater in proportion to the breadth 
of the trunk here than in the preceding variety. Seen 
in profile, the head also appears shorter and more ob- 
tuse than in the latter. The forehead is somewhat 
broader and less convex. The snout is blunter, and 
the cleft of the mouth ascends more sharply, the lower 
jaw closing the mouth like a lid, and the angle formed 
by the lower jaw at its articulation being thus rendered 
more distinct. The pharyngeal teeth in number and 
form exactly resemble those of the Lake Crucian Carp. 
The opercula are distinguished by their being more or 
less convex, whereas in the preceding variety they are 
almost flat. The branchial arches, the branchiostegal 
membranes, and the eyes, both in form and position, 
a Even at a length of 81 ram. this marking is still present in the specimens preserved in spirits in the Royal Museum. That it may 
be even longer persistent in the more elongated varieties of this species, appears from figs. 5 and 6 in Siebold’s Susswasserftsche Mitteleuropas. 
