PLATE LXXIIL 
Sparus Dentex. Lmn.—Arted. Gat. 36. Sjjn. ZO.-^Bioch'. 
t. 268, 
On the 9th of April, 1805, we were agreeably surprised at receiv-> 
ing from one of our assiduous correspondents, a fresh specimen of 
tills curious Sparus, as a supposed oyergrown individual of the Lunated 
gllt-head, Sparus lunatus. This acquisition is of the more import-^ 
ance, as the species is pot mentioned by Pennant, nor any other 
writer on Ichthyology, as having before appeared in the British seas; 
neither do we recollect a specimen of it as a foreign fish in any collec- 
tion of natural history we have. seen. The particulars of its capture 
are few, and of little interest : it was caught in the sea off the coast of 
Hastings, in Sussex, and brought by one of the fishing-smacks, with 
other fish, to Billingsgate for sale, where our correspondent met with 
it. As a Mediterranean fish, Sparus Dentex is perfectly well known 
to the continental naturalists: its importance rests upon its being 
British, and in this point of view we shall be allowed to consider it as 
a valuable accession to the British Fauna, 
Generally speaking, this is a fish of large size. Willughby observes, 
that small fishes of this species are rarely taken, and the same circum- 
stance has been mentioned by later writers. The smallest of those 
that occur in common, according to Bloch, are seldom less than three 
®r four pounds in weight. In the environs of Rome they usually 
exceed that size by at least one half. Our specimen was. considerably 
larger, weighing about sixteen pounds; but this even is comparatively 
trifling to some occasionally found in the warmer parts of Europe. If* 
tliefislt-roarkets at Narboqne, where this species of Sparus infrequently 
