CARl*. 
16 
Pennant records the remarkable instance that “on fishing a 
pond in Dorsetshire, great numbers of Carp were found, each 
with a frog mounted on it; the hind legs clinging to the back, 
the fore legs fixed in the corner of each eye of the fish,” which 
Were thin and greatly wasted. 
The example selected for description measured nineteen inches; 
the body stout and thick, sloping forward from the origin of 
the dorsal fin, but more suddenly from behind the head; the 
snout rounded; under jaw shortest; lips soft; no teeth in the 
jaws; a barb at each angle of the mouth, and a smaller one 
between the angle and the snout. Eye moderate; nostrils large, 
with a valve or cover ; wide across the head, the body stout, 
belly full and round, sloping at the vent; scales large and 
well marked, the border of each with radiating lines. Dorsal 
fin single, beginning above the space where the pectoral ends, 
and continuing opposite the end of the much shorter but wide 
anal; the latter fin being wider than long. The first ray of 
both these fins short, the second long, stout, firm, toothed on 
the hindmost border. Pectorals low on the body, the upper 
four or five rays longest; ventrals separate, expanded; tail 
concave. The general colour is golden yeUow, darker on the 
upper parts; root of each scale brilliant brown. 
According to Mr. Owen, the bones of fi-esh-water fishes are 
lighter than those of the sea; and although this does not hold 
good universally, another observation appears to do so; which 
is, that the most active fishes possess the lightest weight of 
bone, and the bones of the inactive Carp possess more density 
than those of the active Sahnon. 
