I.AKT! BREAM. 
together with the flour and spices for making the pie and the 
charge of conveying it to its destination. — (Pictorial History of 
England, vol. ii.) The Book of St. Albans is a further witness, 
that “the Breeme” was accounted “a noble fysshe and a deyntous,” 
for the taking of which particular directions were given. 
This Bream is considered a very shy fish, and as their 
ordinary habit is to swim in schools, Nilsson informs us that 
in the season when the fishery is carried on in Sweden, in 
some of the parishes near the lake where these fish abound, it 
is forbidden to ring the church bells; that the noise may not 
drive the fish away. Sometimes the success of this fishery is 
such that from ten to forty thousand pounds of Bream have 
been taken at a single haul of the net. 
A reason why this fish is not regarded at genteel tables with 
us is said to be, that they are fimiishcd with such a large 
abundance of small bones, which is in fact, a double row of ribs 
corresponding to those of the herring, shad, and pilchard; and 
it is on this account that the middle portion of the body is 
preferred to the rest; but in autumn, Walton says, they become 
“as fat as a hog,” and then they afford a not unpleasant dish. 
The time of spawning is about the month of May, at which 
time the male is marked with rough white spots about the 
head. In the “Fauna of Norfolk” it is remarked that when 
preparing to spawn they roll about like miniature porpoises; 
the water is discoloured by their working; here a nose appears 
and there a back fin, whilst at intervals a plunge of affright 
amongst the multitude shews that large pike are busy. They 
are a positive nuisance from their numbers in many places. If 
a bow-net is set for Tench, Bream crowd in ere they arrive 
and exclude them. At fii-st the growth of the young is slow, 
and they are not readily distinguished from the next species, 
A. Blicca; but in the course pf time they reach to a lai-ge 
size, and, while a Bream of the weight of fourteen pounds is 
considered of large size, Rondeletius professes to have seen an 
example that measured two cubits in length, with a foot at 
the greatest depth. 
That this fish is retentive of life, and especially possesses 
great power in resisting extreme cold, appears fi-om an instance 
mentioned by Gesner, and often since referred to. — It happened 
that in Poland a large number were contained in a tank, the 
