PLATE LIV. 
sometimes potted with the great Sea Lamprey, and Deing of a much 
milder flavour are in more esteem. Commonly, they are eaten 
stewed like eels. Broiled or fried they are rather tough, and of no 
very pleasant flavour. They bear a low price, and are remarkable 
for having no vertebral bone. 
This fish is prepared for table in another manner, in some part 
of the German empire ; after broiling them, and placing them m 
layers with bay-leaves, spices, and vinegar, they are packed up in 
barrels, and sent to different parts of the country. Bloch, who informs 
us of this particular, acquaints us further, that they are only esteemed 
good in the winter; during the summer, he says they ale not whole- 
some. It is at this season of the year, they are afflicted with a 
disease that breaks out in little excrescences, which the fishermen call 
Tti'itde. They conceal themselves at such times among the stones at 
the bottom of the water, or retire to the sea, from whence they 
migrate into the rivers again in the month of January. Their 
spawning season is in March and April, when they deposit a vast 
number of eggs, among the stones on the banks of rivers, where 
many of them are eagerly devoured by other fishes. 
This creature is extremely tenacious of life, existing many 
hours after it is taken from its native element. On the borders oi 
the river Bausker in Courland, where they are taken of a larger 
size than elsewhere, they are captured in great numbers under the 
ice in the winter, and being packed in snow are conveyed alive to 
very remote parts of the empire. When the Lampreys conveyed 
in this manner are unpacked at the close of their journey, they ap- 
pear torpid, but upon being immersed in cold watci, soon recover 
their activity. 
